Story by Jon Stalnaker AKA The Studebaker Dude
There’s an old saying that I have used, and I think there is a lot of truth in it. “I have probably forgotten more than you know”. It’s meant for these young whipper snappers who think they know everything. I don’t say it that often, as it’s kind of a poke, but when I do, I say it in a bit of a sarcastic way with the intention of being humorous. It doesn’t necessarily mean I’m smarter than them, but I’ve been living in the world of hard knocks, and you learn a lot in that class.
To be fair, there’s a line in Louis Armstrong’s song “What a Wonderful World” that looks at the other side of that comment. He sings, “I see babies cry; I watch them grow. They’ll learn much more than I’ll ever know.” So, the stuff I have forgotten, they probably don’t even need to know. And my frustration with today’s technology is probably funny to my grandchildren.
My memories of events from the 70s, 80s, and 90s are all mixed together in my brain. When someone talks about something that happened 20 years ago, that’s where my brain goes. I have to stop and remind myself that the 90s, 80s, and 70s were 30, 40, and 50 years ago. Dang… when did I get so old?
Those 3 decades were busy times for me. I did a lot of cool things; I did interesting things; I did dangerous things; I did fun things; I did things I shouldn’t have done. I did good things too. I’ve been writing my silly weekly stories now for over a decade, and I still haven’t run out of things to say.
Being a hoarder helps. I’ve got a multitude of paperwork and music that brings back memories. I’ve got walls full of trophies, pictures, plaques, and attaboys that I can’t toss out because I like seeing them and remembering good times.
I made a mistake in last week’s story. The song I sang for my mother’s funeral was not a BJ Thomas song. I looked through my music and found the song on the Wayne Watson record I have. Last week’s story is a good example of memories from probably four decades that seemed like only two decades in my mind. As I was looking through my music collection, I found an empty Pringles can that I had been searching for since we unpacked our STUFF after the move from California. This can was a signed souvenir that I got for a story I wrote for the Studebaker magazine in 2012. I thought it got lost in the move, but I found it in a trunk full of music that I hadn’t looked in for over five years.
Dennis Gage is a friend of Studebakers, so I did a story about him being a key note speaker at the California Auto Museum. Dennis used to work for Proctor and Gamble as a product development scientist and was instrumental in the development of the Pringle chips. He joked that he IS a product development scientist, but he doesn’t portray one on TV. He signed the empty can and noted that the cartoon character with the handlebar moustache on the can is not him. He was IN the can. I was so happy to find this souvenir. I thought it was gone forever. Now maybe you can understand why I don’t want to toss any of my treasured junk.
Above Left: Mozart bust on the Music box. That’s where I found the Pringle can (Above Right)
As much reminiscing as I do in my story telling, it is so handy to have all this information collecting dust in my humble abode. I try to keep it organized but the more I accumulate, the easier it is to misplace something. And the big move halfway across this continent made it easy to misplace things. I’m glad I found it; I’ve probably looked for it a dozen times since we moved to Oklahoma.