The past is so appetising, so heroic. There is a concern welling up inside me that the days of the past were better then the days of now. There is a sense that something has changed, something has gone awry. Tales of the 60s and earlier adventurers overbear on me, compared with the limits, restrictions and over zealous bureaucracy of our day. I have been investigating what it is that makes the past seem so full of promise and adventure and whether it has been lost today. Recently there has been a bombardment on my psyche, forcing me to assess the situation. Grandfather Ken told bristling tales of his adventures in the army, Ziggi and Kurt travelled through war stricken worlds of hardship, authors rubbed it in my face how exciting their existence was and even films have harked back to a sense of freedom and adventure that I feel is less tangible now than the tales of the past make out. Is my life really so dull? Has the world changed? What was different back then?
The Open Arms of Strangers
At some point in the memories of ‘the good old days’ there always seems to be a stranger willing to offer themselves up as host to unforgettable adventures. Why is it that I picture myself walking the streets in the 1950s and being able to carouse and mingle as freely as sand through my hair? My grandfather, man with endless tales, who is one of the oldest pilots licensed in New Zealand and who possess the delightful habit of offering me and himself a drink to celebrate every afternoon I spend with him, is one of those specks of sand. Grandfather Ken was once Sailor Ken, a pilot for the navy, wandering through a US town with another Kiwi seaman on an afternoon off. A car pulls up beside them, no fear of drive-bys or words of abuse as the windows roll down. ‘Hey sailors’ comes the drawl of the South-Western driver, ‘we’re heading just out of town for Lou’s annual party if you boys feel up for it’. Eagerly Ken, a wild but not unusual youth, hops in the back only to be greeted by two fine girls who in turn hop on their laps for lack of space. Off they roll, beers flowing in the back seat almost as smoothly as the conversation, towards their destination. A cool 70 miles later and the locals have yet to get over the gimmick of the kiwi accent and upon arrival the two sailors are forced to stand upon boxes and repeat phrases to the amusement of the fellow partygoers.
The safety of adventure
Travel in the late 21st century is riddled with tales of danger. Thai abductions, hick murders and corrupt police are all a threat to anyone travelling in anything but first/middle-class, protected, custody. Hitch-hiking was once a perfectly sound way to get across a country. Lots of our parents hopped in cars across Europe, mirroring the adventures of Kerouac and others across the pond. My father would not pick up a hitch-hiker today, ‘too much hassle’, what if they were a madman or a scam artist trying to pry a few cents off us. Another symbolic shift is the portrayal of riding trains; images of the 60s, and earlier, paint pictures of bottles of bourbon and rough sunsets, whereas ‘Into the wild’ shows a kid in the 90s (strangely enough attempting to have a non-conformist adventure) riding trains lonely and under the threat of the law that eventually catches him and kicks him off the train and in the ribs. What has happened that has taken away our wild mobil
ity? People still manage of course but there is a lingering sense that the free travel of the past has long been dead, ironically killed by the generation before us that revelled in its existence.
The madness of the tale
The tales that have informed me of these ‘good old days’ are always steeped in madness. Not insanity per se, although often this is part of it, but rather a vibrant clash of characters, events, excitement and action. They are epically gripping stories in a classic literary sense. Kerouac with his mad cap group of ramblers and minor con-artists endlessly seem to provide entertaining anecdotes; whilst Hunter. S Thompson’s internal dialogue provides the backdrop for a similarly ragged but entertaining existence. Perhaps this is part of it; the ‘good old days’ are only passed onto me through fables. Enhanced, manipulated and perhaps even exaggerated in the retelling of the story. The past is refracted through a lens of memory which forgets the dull, trivial and irrelevant but enhances the blood, guts and visceral glory of the adventure. In all honesty I believe the past is of course enhanced, but it remains significantly different to today.
I am certain ideas of randomness, spontaneity, characters, and adventure are still on the tip of our generation’s proverbial tongue. Films we enjoy, books we hold in high regard, conversations, facebook quotes, inter-railing, gap-years and my own desires are enough to assure me there is still a pumping vein of adventure running through us. Of course we have adventures, we all do, some have more than others, some tell their adventures more vividly than others but they seem to have become domesticated since the ‘good old days’. Certain things, events and traits described by people recounting the good old days, whether true or false, are endlessly missed in my day to day experience of modernity.
Perhaps this article has been a pretentious piece tattle that you think has no purpose except to extrapolate my own ramblings about my own boring life. Perhaps you agree and miss the friendliness and opportunities of the past. Perhaps we will run away one day across the globe, me and you, picking up tales to tell future generations so that they also feel their adventures are inadequate in comparison to our glorious frivolity. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
