If not now, when?
Steppenwolf reminded me.
A little while ago I posted a Facebook comment about Radio Paradise, one of the oldest Internet streaming radio stations dating back to the late nineties, and by far my favorite. They were playing a song called The Ostrich by Steppenwolf, released in 1968 when I was sixteen and chomping at the bit for my learner’s permit. I’d just finished watching “quallies” for the 2024 Azerbaijan Grand Prix and was feeling nostalgic. Here are the song’s lyrics:
We’ll call you when you’re six years old And drag you to the factory To train your brain for eighteen years With promise of security But then you’re free And forty years you waste to chase the dollar sign So you may die in Florida At the pleasant age of sixty nine
The water’s getting hard to drink We’ve mangled up the country side The air will choke you when you breathe We’re all committing suicide But it’s alright It’s progress folks keep pushin’ till your body rots Will strip the earth of all its green And then divide her into parking lots
But there’s nothing you and I can do You and I are only two What’s right and wrong is hard to say Forget about it for today We’ll stick our heads into the sand Just pretend that all is grand Then hope that everything turns out ok
You’re free to speak your mind my friend As long as you agree with me Don’t criticize the father land Or those who shape your destiny ‘Cause if you do You’ll lose your job your mind and all the friends you knew We’ll send out all our boys in blue They’ll find a way to silence you
But there’s nothing you and I can do You and I are only two What’s right and wrong is hard to say Forget about it for today We’ll stick our heads into the sand Just pretend that all is grand Then hope that everything turns out ok
My comment: “I post this out of nostalgia but read the lyrics. Shouldn’t we all be dead by now? Wait, some of us are... but nobody reading this.” Which got me to thinking, particularly the line about dying in Florida at “the pleasant age of sixty-nine.” I just turned seventy-two in the agreeably funky and artsy hamlet of Floral City, Florida. But before age thirty I’d been to Europe four times, starting with a semester in Italy as a Junior at Massachusetts College of Art and Design in 1972/73, followed by trips to the 1975 Twenty Four Hours of Le Mans and five days at the Nürburgring with the BMWCCA during a 1978 driving tour of Germany and France in a rented Mercedes. It never occurred to me that my last visit would be a trip to England and Ireland with my parents and brother in 1981 to visit relatives.
My sporadic Substack scribblings attempt, among other things, to overlay a frame of reference to the past seven+ decades as I’ve experienced them. I started a “series” called Blue Lightbulb in which I planned to document my life from my earliest memory to the present. I’ve published installment number one and started a second that’s yet to see the light of day. Now I’m thinking more action to go with the writing might be the order of the day.
A few days ago I responded to a commenter in this space about the Canadian Grand Prix. Here’s what I wrote:
Several friends and I attended the Formula One Canadian Grand Prix three years running: ’96, ’97 and ’98, starting the year after Jacques Villeneuve won the Indy 500. He immediately challenged for the World Championship, winning pole in his first F1 race at Australia. The next year he won the title and the third tried unsuccessfully to defend it. What blast! Montreal was Villeneuve Central those years!
We bought a package from Grand Prix Tours International and had rooms at the Hotel InterContinental where several drivers were staying. We were treated to presentations hosted by the likes of Jackie Stewart, Johnny Herbert and Gerhard Berger. Lots of great food, open bar... the whole nine, for three days.
My parents didn’t drive so I grew up riding the Boston subway system and the idea of taking a train to a race track and emerging from deep underground to the sounds of screaming V10s was delightfully disorienting!
One night we ate at what a reviewer called most the expensive seafood restaurant in the city, where Al Pacino and his posse sat across the room.
Mid-forties, facing divorce, Monaco in my sights for my next adventure... Funny, things kind of stalled out after that, although I do get to enjoy the IndyCar and IMSA races here in Central Florida each year as a consolation prize. And I've got those great memories!
I wondered if Grand Prix Tours still existed. Turns out it does, although they dropped the word International for some reason. A talking head on today’s F1 TV Pro broadcast mentioned that the “new” section of Baku, Azerbaijan was intentionally designed to mimic Paris, which it does. Of course, new is a relative term, with structures in the “old” portion of the city dating back to the ninth century. The city remained the capital of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Hmm, thought I, “I’ll bet tickets to a Formula One race in that part of Yurup are cheaper than ones to our local F1 autocross GP in Miami. Let me check.”
Well, it turns out 2025 race packages haven’t gone on sale yet but they have for the ‘25 Hungarian Grand Prix, close enough for government work given that Hungary was also an Axis country for decades. Here are details for packages to that GP including accommodation, race tickets and events like the ones my friends and I experienced in Montreal in the nineties, starting at $1,695.00. A passport and a cheap airplane ticket and Bob’s your uncle!
Conclusion: this is fuckin’ doable! Stay tuned!
UPDATE 9/17/24: The screen grabs above were from qualifying. The race turned out to be even better. Who’s joining me in Baku in 2025?
Today’s Musical Interlude
I was six and remember my babysitter playing this.
I just booked tickets and travel to Suzuka for next year. Baku would be the next one I'd want to see.