Suddenly, it’s 2015!
[BUMPED UP]
Now, how did that happen?
The last year I remember noticing as a big transition was the year 2000. We had entered science fiction territory, and 2001 was similar because of the Stanley Kubrick film.
But after that it’s all a blur. How did it pass so quickly? That’s a cliche, but there’s no question that as you get older time seems to fly by more rapidly. One reason is that each segment of time is now a much smaller percentage of the total amount you’ve been alive. A year? Almost a blink.
These days when I try to figure out how much time has passed since an event my gut reaction is to use 2000 as the index year. So, for example, if something happened in 1976 my first response would be to say that that was 24 years ago. Way off, obviously; to get the right answer I have to take that figure and add the current year of the 21st century to it. It’s a laborious process, but since for me the changing year number seems to have stopped at 2000 there’s no way around it.
The title of this post was inspired by a memory from my extreme youth. I was enchanted by a TV car ad campaign from the year 1957 that used the catch-phrase, “Suddenly, it’s 1960!” to indicate how futuristic its car design was. All I had been aware of in my very short life up to that point were the 1950s, and the idea of a decade of 1960s was magical.
Speaking of magical, thanks to the magic of YouTube here’s one of those ads. Until now I wasn’t sure it wasn’t a mere figment of my imagination. You can see why the time-travel aspects appealed to me much more than any message about cars, which I barely even registered. My driving years were still a long way off:
My parents both always drove Chryslers, my mother the small Plymouth Valiant type and my father the big one (before that it was always a DeSoto, but that line was discontinued in the real 1960). And come to think of it, the couple at the very tail end of that ad could pass for my parents if you squinted.
Im using the 2020 as my benchmark year… Works as well as a past date.
“Suddenly, it’s 2015!”
Are you kidding me? I’m still trying to get over the fact that “1984” isn’t in the future any more. Both, in terms of the actual year and the way things are heading.
But, here’s to wishing you, Neo, and your family (that includes your blog family as well) a Healthy and Happy New Year!
Related tidbits:
In the 1985 movie “Back To the Future”, Marty McFly goes back thirty years to 1955; in “Back To The Future II”, he goes forward thirty years to 2015. What the ??
Don’t you (or maybe you don’t) remember the sci-fi tee vee series from the 1970s, “Space: 1999”? Starred Martin Landau and wife Barbara Bain, right?
From my boyhood, I recall a “C”-caliber horror flick with the futuristic title “Frankenstein 1970”. Wow!
And Charles (3:39 pm) is on target regarding “1984” — when’d *that* happen?
I’m getting that Plymouth for my second car. The one I let my girlfriend drive.
For sure. I offer several other thoughts, none of which are mutually exclusive.
IMO It all points to the fundamental perceptual nature of time. Yes, time might exist outside of our existence, but I offer that it is our existence and our awareness of it that gives it meaning and quality (quality time?). Many years ago I had this same discussion with a close friend who was a physician. He took the clinical point of view that a second is a second is a second. My question was: Which seems longer, a 90 second
ride on a roller coaster or getting poked in the eye with a stick for 90 seconds? They’re both 90 seconds long, but . . . .
The Chrysler brands’ forward look was a high water mark in automotive design.
As for being in the future: where is my flying car?
Old cars are so cool looking: tail fins and candy colors! New cars are a Big Snooze.
I’ve been thinking (I’m a 1956 model myself) that life is like Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg: my elders marching ahead of me have been mowed down at an alarming rate, and I’m closer to the stone wall bristling with Yankee guns than I’d like. The kids, behind me, are largely oblivious to all this.
I also find New Year’s Eve saddening. I focus too much on what is lost and behind me, and too little on what may lie ahead.
And dadgummit, I miss being able to watch the football games on TV!!!
M J R
My Dad’s hoping the Cubs win the the World Series like in Back to the Future II.
When the old honkey tonk
will save Saturday night
and old London town
and throw out true blight
who can tell?
But you can know for sure
that the classics and
truth will endure
and in this new year
may be the cure.
Don’t give up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2PCBx6s9SY
Breaking news: Mario Cuomo died today. Just out.
Beverly: and Cuomo’s death is already recorded in Wikipedia. My immediate reaction was that he was rather young to die- and found out he was 82.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Cuomo
…1950 Ford…Dad bought new…’55 Ford… Same …’58 Ford…Same…. ’64…Ford…Same… Coolest Luxury Vehicle I ever rode in…EVER… was Uncle Tom’s white ’53 Buick Roadmaster Coupe…O*M*G*!! Red & Black leather…. What a set’a wheels,’Yo.
Gringo:
82 is too young to die. At least, it feels that way to me as I inch closer.
Average male life expectancy in the U.S. is 76.5 years. When a man is 82 he has beat the averages and has a further life expectancy of 7 years. However, that assumes no diseases of aging (cancer, cardiovascular, alzheimers, etc.) are present in advanced form. Each year the odds of death increase. You can read about it in an actuarial table. http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/STATS/table4c6.html
Each year of my dotage is an opportunity to learn more and try to stay involved in life – even as my physical prowess wanes. At my age my grandfather on my father’s side had a bad short term memory, but he could remember details of his childhood very clearly. I’m not at that point yet, but find myself spending quite a lot of time reflecting on memories of the past and trying to put it in perspective.
Matthew M. at 5:19 is definitely onto something.
I understand what you mean, Neo, in the post (and I’m old enough to remember Jack Parr advertising Chryslers with a diamond kaleidoscope background). But it’s not going feel like the future to me until I’m driving my own flying car.
Stanley Kubrick got close to imagining Skype. But he was more wrong than right in his predictions. See Yogi Berra.
Matthew, 7:57 pm — “My Dad’s hoping the Cubs win the the World Series like in Back to the Future II.”
As a Baltimore Orioles fan, I’m amenable to that — provided, of course, that my O’s don’t make it to the Series the same year. If they don’t, best wishes; if they do, we’ll be mortal enemies [ smile ]!
Neo,
Words can hardly address the impact your third paragraph had on me. It is because I have unwittingly processed time and events with similar, contorted perspective.
Thank you for sharing that. It almost leaves me with the notion that I may not be as “whacked” (Boston term) as originally suspected.
_______________________________________
Because you broached the subject of cars, I thought you might appreciate this relevant and juicy bit of news. “Relevant” because it represents a radical change in this market. Related to your reference to automobile commercial in 1960.
“Juicy”, because it reveals just how much politics has affected this market. And it peels back the veneer of lies, misrepresentation, and wasted resources we’ve been subjected as a result of the narrative of those who’ve boarded this train…
A great article:
http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/can-tesla-survive-collapsing-gas-prices/ar-BBhoh7x
“Subsidizing rich people’s toys…”. Now that is a motto for the ages.
Government SUBSIDIES are huge on this product/company.
I would love to see it fail if only for that reason.
Oh wait, there is another reason:
The carbon footprint for this vehicle is much greater than for gas-powered vehicles. Producing the battery alone is huge in toxicity and environmental damage. Then to operate the vehicle with coal-powered energy. The fact remains—no amount of windmills and solar panels would ever be sufficient to keep Tesla vehicles running on the highways and byways. Period. At least not on the scale Tesla would like to see its product succeed at.
As the analyst says in the video. “…but, we can’t talk about that…”.
Not with, or to, the customers of Tesla, the ideologues who support Tesla, or the politicians who’ve aided and abetted the project.
If Progressives had their way, this would be their, “Suddenly it’s 1960” moment in the future of automobiles.
Thanks to each of you who participate in this blog.
I wish for you a wonderful (healthy, fun, prosperous) new year.
I wish for you that you share your valuable wisdom with others in “real” life (you know what I mean) as you do in this format.
I wish that each of you contribute to the effort to elevate the morale of this country, as it is such a needed and necessary element to the survival of America.
I wish that each of you inspire the youth in this country to reach beyond their grasp. And to question just what it is that they value in life—and why.
God Bless.
Wow, is it 2015 already? When i was in high school my first car I shared with my mom. it was a 1960 Chevy Impala hardtop with a 348 cu. in. engine that was her grocery getter and my drag racing car car on a marked off 1/4 mile stretch of paved country road a few miles out of our small town. By 1960 they were making some nice cars with good transmissions, am radio and air-conditioning and huge front and back bench seats about the size of a twin bed.
By the time I was 18 in 1963 I could not imagine why anyone would want to live past 30 years age and I felt indestructible. I read enough science fiction to know that by the year 2,000 we would all have bubble cars that could fly and a bunch of stuff like that. However I don’t recall at all thinking about myself as a happy grandfather with great kids and grandkids and years passing by extremely fast.
I wish everyone a Happy New Year, especially Neo-neocon for her thoughtful web site and nice collection of commenters, may all of you have a blessed new year. My personal hope is to be thankful for what I do have and as my years run themselves on out, ever so fast, enjoy all of the good stuff that seems to continue to come my way. We might as well smile every time we have the chance because the pay is the same either way.
I heard that announcers voice a zillion times as a kid I think it was George Fenneman, the announcer on Groucho’s show, but (talk about fading memories) it has now been so long I wouldn’t care to make a wager on it.