opinion

Chuck Avery: Codgerism as measured in meters

Chuck Avery is on vacation. He provided this column, one of his past favorites. — Editor

Back in the mid-1970s, I bought a new Volkswagen, my first foreign car.

I selected it after reading several reviews, all of which rated this particular model as one of the best autos of the year.

Because every car I had ever driven had the dimmer switch on the floor and because I have an aversion to reading instruction booklets — this would include owners' manuals — for several evenings, I threw my brights at oncoming cars, all the time stomping my foot on the floorboard.

I owned the VW for about a week before I found the dimmer switch on the steering column, a location that has since been standardized on American cars. Now it seems the natural place for a dimmer switch.

I recalled the dimmer incident the other day after missing the tip-off of the Butler basketball game. I hurried to the basement family room and began punching what I thought was the power button on the remote, punctuating each jab with increasingly louder imprecations concerning technology. To no avail; the screen remained dark.

My wife Michelle calmly took the remote from me and turned on the set. Then she reminded me that the on/off button for the kitchen set and the bedroom set is on the right; for this set it was located on the left.

"At least," she said, "you had the television remote. Not like the other day when you were cussing the TV and turning the DVD player on and off."

I pointed out that we have four remotes on the coffee table. "And every one different," I said. "Why don't they put the buttons in the same place on all of them? By the way, that's another reason I don't own a 'smart' phone."

Even more frustrating is starting to work on a piece of machinery only to discover that I have brought a standard set of wrenches to loosen a metric bunch of bolts — or vice versa. One of my friends who works on cars as a hobby frequently complains about the problem but resists all arguments for the U.S. going to metric. His reply is that he is an American; therefore, he prefers American weights and measures.

When I mention the simple regularity of the metric system, especially when contrasted to one with units based on the width of some dead English king's thumb or the length of another's arm, he answers once again, "I don't care about all that. I am an American."

Citing nationalism to rationalize folly is not unusual; politicians are especially skillful at it. But in my friend's case I think a combination of tradition and closed-mindedness is being masked as patriotism. That, and the natural resistance to change.

I once heard a scientist say that it takes 20-30 years before any new thought in science is accepted. That period has little to do with the validity of the thought; rather, it takes that long for the adherents of the old way of thinking to die off.

If we of the older generation would stop worrying about ourselves and concentrate on future generations, we could achieve wonders — a universal system of measure, a second language common to all, even an end to prejudice and chauvinism.

But most of us would agree only if these proposals were stated in American English as spoken by middle-class WASPs.

And measured in inches.

Chuck Avery is a Hagerstown resident. Contact him at charlesravery@gmail.com.