IML: Imperial love / hate relationship

["Hugh, 58 Imperial" <imperial58@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

In the vein of Laurie's recent contribution, let me just say that bringing 
"my" 58 into the family was never a deal breaker but it has caused some 
intense emotional responses along the way.  First thing worth saying is the 
car does not belong to me.  It is owned by a museum.  I used to be the 
chairman of the board and am now it's manager, part-time, badly paid but 
loving it.  I fell for the 58 hard.  After a long time working on it at the 
museum, it became runnable enough to bring it home, which at that time was 
an apartment.  I never wanted to own a house, but my wife did, and my way in 
was a garage for the 58.  I turned down several house because the car would 
not fit into the garage or the entrance was too awkward.  Anyhoo, soon 
enough we found a place when the car could squeeze in with inches to spare 
on each side, and almost none fore and aft.  The funny thing is that the 
house and the car are contemporary to each other and all cars were pretty 
big back then but there you have it.

My daughter, now 13, loved the car from the get go, especially being picked 
from school in it.  I'd let her sit on the arm rest in the middle of the 
back seat with a wee strap to keep her in place.  Twas she who named it Mrs. 
Blueberry.  My best compliment on the name came from a real head turner 
female member of my local Mopar club who said it took a real man to have the 
guts to call his car Mrs. Blueberry and introduce it as such to anyone and 
everyone.  I hadn't thought of it that way until then but was happy to be 
given the idea and the ego stroke.  However, my wide hated the car, 
completely and resolutely.  She referred to it as my girl friend.  When 
people phoned she'd say, "Oh, he's under his girl friend, let me get him for 
you."  My boss called once and that took more than a little explaining.

Anyhoo, things changed when she started riding in it.  Folks would go nuts 
as we drove along.  Hooting, hollering, waving, big thumbs up, honking, the 
whole tilt.  Funnily enough, I hardly noticed.  I've been in so many parades 
and other events over the last fifteen years, I just don't see it anymore. 
But my wife loved the attention.  She waves back and does the whole happy 
owner thing.  The fact that spending money on the car counts as a donation 
to a registered charity and gets us tax breaks doesn't hurt either.  Now she 
wants me to get the car painted so it won't be so embarrassing to be seen 
with it.  From pull back to push forward.  I'll take it.

Another sweet response came when my parents came to stay.  My father hated 
the car.  It represented to him, the stolid Englishman, the worst excesses 
of Americana.  Loud, large, and a waste of the earth's precious and scarce 
resources.  Not my mother though, she was happier than my daughter.  Sat 
there in the back seat doing the royal wave like she was born to it.  She 
thought the time I spent polishing a newly acquired set of 67/68 hub caps, 
which go so well with the 58's grill, if you happen to have 15 inch wheels 
on your 58 and not the original 14s, was total madness.  She said she wished 
I'd spent so much time on my studies.  Now the drop-out has written and had 
published one book and is working on another.  I'm desperate to get the 
Imperial onto the cover.  Time and money, as ever, are the problems.  And so 
it goes.

Hugh 



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