Yesterday, I spent the day doing what I really like ... looking at cars and watching people. I went to the Barrett-Jackson car auction. One of 7 car auctions in the Phoenix area this week. I can't make to all of them but I will manage to get to a couple. Yeah, I know am a 'motorhead'. But the other thing I love to do at car auctions, and actually anytime I am in the midst of a large group of people, I love just watching them. No it's not creepy or weird, it's interesting to see people interact and their reactions to normal daily things.
At a car show or auction, as the case was yesterday, their expressions about a car they would love to own, or the price it is sold for, or the nonchalant gaze they give a car as the slowly walk by. As if they don't want to other people see how much they like it or dream the have it. Then there are the young couples who goggle over their dream car in their future someday. Oh, then there are the rich elderly men with a 'companion' (not necessarily their wife) on their arm who have bought some many cars because they can. Or the motorhead like me that look at the different styles and inventive ways customizers have reshaped metal changing the body into something unique and very cool.
I see all manners of people coming to events like these with their children, a date, wives, a bunch of guys and just a single person by themself. You really didn't have to be a car enthusiast, you could just be someone who was just looking for something to do. But let me warn you, it got very crowded when thousands of people pour into some overgrown tents, and everyone wants to gather around more than 2,500 cars checking out every angle of the car and they won't move when your carrying a couple overflowing glasses of beer to your buddies. Sometimes, some person gets a touch bit rude. Not me of course.
It does not matter if your skin color is white, black, brown, yellow, red or something in between. Car shows and auction are always a hit. And to see all these different cultures coming together in a one common event they all like is heartwarming to me. That, to me, a world that has differences, but can group together without getting dismissed by others different from you. It's the same at sporting events, concerts, amusement parks etc. I partly grew up in the 'Jim Crow' era in the deep South where whites ONLY associated with whites and blacks were not allowed in town at night, and stuck within their part of town. As a child that hurt me, and I could not understand why. When an elderly black man, I was about to pass, stepped off the sidewalk, into traffic because I was white and I deserved the entire sidewalk? To this day, that still hurts. We are ALL the same race ... the human race. And under that one layer of skin, we are ALL the same. We just have to put our biases aside and join hands to make the world a better place FOR ALL.
Yes I enjoyed my day at Barrett-Jackson. I didn't buy anything, but I was one of those who drooled over a couple cars. But I wiped it off as I looked around. 😃 Take care and stay safe.
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