07/07/2015
FEATURE BY MAX NOBLE
It's an Autumn day, late morning sunlight streaming through the kitchen window with that magical liquid quality that makes you dreamy and slow in a comforting way. You're young, still in shorts.
Your grandmother comes through the door, busying about her morning with a smile, she passes-by, placing a fresh picked apple on the table.
"For you, specially picked!" she exclaims before gliding from the room with the lazy photons.
Not rising from your daydream you fumble for the apple without looking, and grasping it take a large, slow bite. Man, that's good. Ah... perfect. The sharp, yet sweet, taste of the fresh apple plays around your mouth. The crisp, firm texture feeling perfect. Eyes closing, the moment is complete. You are wordlessly happy, such that even the daydream drifts from your mind, and only the delights of this sensational autumn apple, gifted from a loved one, fills your being. For this moment you are happy, the experience is perfect and you want nothing more.
Thirty plus years drift by. Filled with the things that go to make-up a life. A few times you recall that dreamy morning. Not often, but always fondly.
You're back in that same kitchen. Rain weeping down the windows now, both grandmother and the autumn sun are gone. You spot an apple hunched alone in the fruit bowl on the table. It looks fresh, perfectly ripe for eating. You pick it up, bright fragments of those dreamy autumn mornings defined by perfect apples dance in your mind as you turn it in your hand, pausing before you take that first bite.
You bite. Sadness. Too bitter. Too soft. Lacks edge. No hint of lasting sweetness. Like a wine critic passed a red cordial laced with cheap vodka, you screw-up your face, swiftly spitting the offending contents of your mouth into a bin. Even the apples are crap these days. The let-down is complete, happiness drains from you as memories of the apples of your father claw harpy-like at your mind, tempting you to drown blissfully in the welcoming seas of the past.
Apple discarded in the bin, you exit, lock the door, and without looking back, walk away.
What ever happened to all the good apples?
Medical research suggests that with age not only do we lose taste buds in our mouths but our sense of smell, so critical to taste, also fades away. Those perfect apples of youth have not changed in any meaningful manner. It is we who have changed. Our ability to discern the delights of our youth, when coupled with the battle-scars of life that each year dim the glow of our youthful optimism, cause the enjoyment to fade. The loss is not due to the poor quality of today's offered delights.
I vividly remember the tragic footage of Gilles Villeneuve's 1982 Zolder crash, and Niki Lauda's fiery 1976 Nurburgring horror. One great man taken from us in an instant, while another fights on to become a true living legend, still with us today. Gilles is forever young in our memory, the hero 'frozen' at his peak for all time. Niki growing old, a past star who looks a touch less heroic with each passing year.
Mansell around the outside. Senna on the grass. Arnoux banging wheels. Hunt sliding it by and keeping it together for once. An endless blur of summer delights that I can recall whenever I close my eyes. Always fresh.
More sweet perfection? Michael in the wet. Alesi in the wet. Damon spinning yet again in the wet. All brave. All deserving. All delivering great sport that therefore was axiomatically great entertainment. All the sweetest of apples in the most perfect of light.
Moderate dollars. Simple advertising. Smiling drivers. Scowling drivers. Dead drivers. All heroes. All remembered.
And now?
Alonso around the outside. Kimi at Suzuka. Webber at Monaco. Vettel in the wet. Michael and Jules tragically fighting other battles. Hell, even Bernie wants to remember Michael as he was. Yet sweet moments abound, still.
Moss and Surtees still remember. Murray Walker still remembers. Jackie and Niki remember. And yes, Max and Bernie remember. Yet all of them know that today matters most, because today, right now, is all that we have. You cannot rehash the past, you can only hope for the future. Right now is the only time you can act, and enjoy the result of the actions you take. Look at how each of them lives their public life, especially Bernie, and you can see that right now is all that concerns them. The past is for wishful smiles as the sun sets on us alone.
The cars are still fast. The moments of bravery are there each race. The money, power, and prestige have never been higher.
Was it really that much better all those years ago? Or have our tastes been dulled, while we shine the apples of the past to perfection? It is not so much that the world has changed, rather we have changed. Not for better or worse, simply different to how we were.
Acknowledge that and embrace the moments presented to you. In the world today change is our only constant travel companion. Why not share an apple and enjoy the journey together?
We need to press for change in Formula One. We can polish it to a better state than it is in right now. However, we have too many grey beards recalling the apples of their youth, with a touch too much fondness, and too little regard for how they have changed over the years. And, yes, how the world has changed in all those years.
Jean Todt is right when he laments that F1 has no more than a "headache". What afflicts the sport can be fixed. Sure it needs firm, clear, action, but it can, and must, be fixed. The bigger problem is the obsession with the apples of the past by some leading figures within F1 management, teams, and finally, and most problematically, the fans. This sport has no taste left in it! We all exclaim throwing our hands in the air.
We need a great Jedi Master like Obi-wan or the Dali Llama to walk into our lives and calmly sort the entire situation by proclaiming, "Let go Luke…" thus freeing us from the illusions of the past.
Of course this metaphysical fix works far faster if Todt can swiftly find the jar of painkillers to perfectly address F1's 'headache', he must play his part.
For a start we have some old apples that need a polish and then to be reset at the front of the fruit bowl. Monza, Spa, Monaco, clean German tarmac, sweet flowing French curves. We already have so many apples of the past that can be refreshed and served anew today! Fresh as the day they were tenderly picked all those years ago.
Our apples are now, and they are the only ones we've got. Let us do our part by giving Todt the time he needs to get the medicine jar down off the top shelf and ease the pain. We can try and steady the stool for him as he reaches up, try to ensure no one else kicks it away. We as fans do have a role to play here, today, now. Give the man space to tend to the patient.
We cannot go back and eat the apples of our fathers. And nor should we.
We should smile and wish them well when they once more tell us how much better it was back then. Then we must eat what we have now, and enjoy.
Learn more about Max and check out his previous features, here.