[img]139|left|Jessica Gadsden||no_popup[/img]
My Dell was a dud.
I have two passions: photography and writing. In the last few month when I have been writing (and maybe browsing the Internet, balancing my checkbook – multi-tasking), my computer has been slow. Very slow. My thoughts and hands move faster than the cursor on my screen, and I have to wait, impatiently, for it to catch up.
So it was with glee and relish that I shopped for my first new desktop computer in seven years. I painstakingly visited website after website, found out what was going to allow me to write without waiting, facilitate digital image manipulation, play my games fast, and avoid the bug- infested Windows Vista. After several months, I settled on a sharp-looking silver and black computer that was to be customized to my exact specifications. I placed my order and waited.
Three days earlier than scheduled, my computer arrived. I cleared my office of five pets and one husband. Slowly and carefully, I peeled back the protective plastic, breathing in that new computer smell, plugged it in, and pressed the power button.
Then, nothing.
That’s right. It didn’t start. There was some odd clicking noise, and then, nothing. Absolute silence. It was dead. I know. You’re thinking, this was a one off. Don’t judge all American products by that one experience. But I’m not. The same exact thing happened to me seven years ago—the last time I bought a new computer. Okay, not the same exact thing. The last computer was a Gateway, and the electrical box exploded on the second day I owned it.
I’ll spare you the end of the Dell story. Suffice it to say, the replacement computer arrived and it was a dud, too.
Where am I going with this? Well, my foreign-made Sony Vaio notebook computer worked straight out of the box with nary a problem.
I think I see a pattern.
Who Buys American?
The Big Three automotive executives recently testified that the way to solve their financial woes is for Americans to buy American cars. Fifty-three percent of us don’t. Setting aside for a moment the problems with government subsidies of private corporations in what is ostensibly a free-market economy, American consumers can’t save the Big Three because most of us are simply unwilling to buy American cars. (And I’ll have no more American computers, thank you very much).
I took an informal survey of everyone I know, and only one person (my mother-in-law) has an American car. But she’s still sore over World War II, the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, and the German Holocaust. Even her husband buys Japanese.
Last week, when I heard local G.M., Chrysler and Ford dealers on the radio pleading for people to come on down and buy their cars, I listened attentively. In part, because I’m also in the market for a new car for the first time in seven years.
I had never considered buying an American car, but perhaps that had been a knee-jerk reaction to my childhood, when my mother owned a Ford Maverick. She was not alone. In the 1970s, almost everyone on our block in Brooklyn had an American car. My grandmother, who lived with us, always had a Chevy Nova. Every few years it seemed to change color, but it was always the same car. Our more upscale neighbors drove Cadillacs the size of boats with gleaming grills and wide chrome fenders.
Our Maverick had two outstanding traits – it was a ‘70s day-glow yellow-orange, and it was always in the shop. I remember lots of trips on the train to and from the repair shop, bored to death by traveling to get a car only to drive back home. Obviously my mother didn’t like all those trips either because her next car was a Toyota. She bought it in 1982, and it never had a problem. We would putt, putt by our neighbors’ American cars and still others languishing on the side of the highway waiting on a tow, smug in our satisfaction that we wouldn’t end up like them.
Should I Open My Mind?
I inherited the Toyota in 1989 and drove it until 1996, and it only broke down once – a fairly good track record for 14 years.
So now that I was again in the market for a new car, I tried to open my mind to the prospect of an American. I did not want to be limited by an irrational childhood fear. The two words that still come to mind when I think about American cars are unsafe and unreliable. From my mother’s Maverick to the exploding Pinto and rollover-prone Explorer, I do not get the sense that safety is a top priority.
Because I’m a little worried about an economy people keep referring to as “the worst since the Great Depression,” I haven’t bought my new car just yet. I went onto the Internet and looked for cars that had all the features I wanted – safety, comfort and reliability – and even considered the American counterpart to my foreign options.
The available American choices in the class of car I am seeking? Cadillac, Buick and Lincoln. Why does American luxury have to equal big? Has anyone in Detroit heard of the limited supply of fossil fuels? These dealers advertise V8 engines and a chassis like a boat. Apparently, the 1970s are back in full force. Most models are a full two feet longer than my current car. Two feet. I couldn’t even imagine how I’d fit that in my garage, or in the myriad of compact parking spaces that dot Southern California.
Crucial to Think Ahead
I don’t know if General Motors will ultimately fail, but buying a car from a manufacturer that may not be able to honor the warranty is a scary thought. The dealers were undaunted. They seemed eager to sell warranties to fill the potential gaps of manufacturer warranties. I was not comforted.
That left me with Lincoln. Then my husband informed me that a Lincoln was really a Ford – of Pinto, and Explorer and Maverick fame. I shivered, and passed.
My experiences with American products over the last few decades have not been positive. Politicians talk about the United States as being at the forefront of innovation, but I think these folks haven’t been in an airport in Hong Kong or on a European high-speed rail line recently. Building it bigger – whether it’s our gargantuan houses big cars, or huge desktop computer towers – is not building it better.
So, fairly, or not, I’ve settled on another Japanese sedan. It may be boring, but I think a smallish, headache-free ride will be worth it.
Jessica Gadsden has been controversial since the day she discovered her inner soapbox. She excoriated the cheerleaders on the editorial page of her high school paper, transferred from a co-educational university to a women's college to protest the gender biased curfew policy, published a newspaper in law school that raked the dean over the coals with (among other things) the headline, "Law School Supports Drug Use"—and that was before she got serious about speaking out. Progressive doesn't begin to define her political views. She's a reformed lawyer, and full time novelist who writes under a pseudonym, of course.This will mark the debut of our newest, and perhaps most charismatic, weekly essayist. A Brooklyn native, she divided her college years between Hampton University and Smith.
Ms. Gadsden’s essays appear every other Tuesday. She may be contacted at Jessica@alumnae.smith.net
