Dude, Where's My Car? (on classiccarbook.co.uk?)

Delete ‘dude’ and add the word ‘classic’ and suddenly this bad teenage flick title has resonance: ‘Where’s my classic car?’ It’s a ’73 Capri, a Mark 1 Golf, or a Triumph Vitesse etc, etc. They haven’t been mislaid or stolen and they aren’t even my classics. They’re the opening lines of those poignant advertisements in the classic car magazines. Submitted mainly by men like Derek from Dorset, or Clive from Huntingdon who suddenly feel the urge to put pen to paper in a trippy fit of publically displayed nostalgia and regret over a car they owned 30 years ago.

Partly the blame lies with the classic car magazines preying on our latent desires for old cars. Pages packed with an array of engaging stories, their positive words so reassuring, imbued as they are with a sense of excitement that you can relate to and an unshakable faith in out-dated technology that perhaps you can’t, but no matter, you suspend disbelief anyway. These articles draw us in with glossy photos of pristine paintwork and pleasingly familiar lines. They remind you of what made cars great in period and provide you with various reasons why they are still great, and why you should want to own one now. How many times have you read an article and inspired, flicked to the price guide at the back? You scan the pricing, usually in four categories; poor, good, excellent and dealer/ concourse, delusion reigns as you try to ignore the fifth unwritten category ‘cars selected for magazine articles.’ Quite rightly magazines strive to show you the best examples of a model they can find, but are sadly never representative of most of the crap we all gawp at on eBay Motors. In any case, the damage is done, they’ve triggered those unpractical emotions and made you want cars you know are bad for you. You know this because years ago you suffered the inconvenience of owning one of these cars and yet suddenly you want them back.

Derek from Dorset again suddenly desires his Rover P4, forgetting the steering wasn’t opposed to pulling him into the on-coming traffic. Clive from Huntingdon forgets that his old Capri wasn’t averse to setting itself on fire. On the M1. These things have become distant memories, the grown up in us dissolves along with our usual sanity preserving ability to undertake a mental checks and balances list. The minds puppeteer creeps in and temporarily rearranges reality, you find yourself minimising factors such as space, cost, practicality and reliability and maximising factors such as shininess and acoustic satisfaction (yes shiny vroom vroom). And let’s be clear on the cars themselves. The ones we most desire are the ones we have owned and could own again, no rarefied celebrity Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa or a Bugatti Type 41 Royale’s thank you very much. We just want our every day cars from yesteryear, normo cars that have just gotten old, inferred classic status because, despite all the odds, they have avoided the crusher.

This craving for cars that have long since disappeared from our lives defies all reason and yet neatly distils the drama of the classic car obsession. Secretly we know that in all likehood these machines have been crushed long ago and turned into the tumble driers in our kitchens, yet I once saw my mum’s old Nissan Primera in New Malden a few years after we thought it was a goner. However, we are talking about three years rather than thirty since ownership, so road legality wasn’t quite yet in the realm of fantasy. I constantly saw my Austin Maestro years after it was sold, but it was bought by someone very local. The new owner had the worst eczema I had ever seen and I would often see one of his Turkish delight arms poking out the window as he motored by. I couldn’t help imagining the profusion of human dust in my poor old car.

Time for my own ‘have you seen my car?’ advert, which is as follows:

Mini City E, 1985, Registration C431JGT, in Russet Brown. Sold to some kid in the Farnborough area in the early double 00’s it had body work that could be described as near mint and is sadly missed. Any information as to its whereabouts gratefully received. £10 reward waiting for the information leading to its purchase. Please contact https://twitter.com/classiccarman

I could have chosen one of at least ten cars so why the mini.....I would be lying if I said it was because I thought it stood the best chance of survival. I think mostly it is curiosity over its condition. Much in the same way some people wonder how an ex has aged, I wonder how much the mini’s body work has suffered with the ravages of time and whether or not the intermittent engine fault finally consigned it to the scrapper. I really think there is a niche market for a car equivalent of Facebook. Classiccarbook perhaps. I would join and I think Clive and Derek might too. We could all post details of our former cars and ask the world if they know of them....are our cars still alive and if so, can I have at least one of them back?