Riveting Stuff

This is the first piece of writing on my new laptop. A piece of kit, I must say, that’s a vast improvement on the old one. The screen resolution is better, the operating program seems an improvement and it certainly works faster. Even the keyboard feels better. It should be no surprise, of course, it's a whole five years newer. Yes, it certainly is a better machine. How odd that if it hadn't been for the sudden death of the old one I would never have gone out and bought it in the first place. I would have struggled on, in the dark ages, making do with dated technology.

Well, that’s not completely true. In many ways the old one wasn't that much different from this one, and when you consider what most of us actually do with our computers, I would probably have carried on using it for a number of years to come. I miss the familiarity of that old laptop; I knew my way round it. I'd grown used to its quirks and the little problems that had developed during our years together. It was like an old friend. And all my files were on it; files which will now have to be transferred. I have to ask myself if this really is a better machine for me, for what I do.

However, you really need to consider the long view, and the wider sphere of life in general, to  see that renewal is always a good thing. Advancement in every arena is essential - not just in computers - and where would we be if some of the old ideas had not been replaced? Would we still believe that the sun and the planets rotate around the earth? Just as everything must grow old and die, so that it can be renewed, even we must die so that the young can relearn and re-evaluate. If Newton had been allowed to live forever at the expense of newer scientists, Einstein might never have come along with his new explanation of gravity. As the old die away, new objective thinkers come along, uncluttered by dogma so that new ideas, new technologies and new machines are born. It's as simple as that.

Well, not quite. There is the tempering effect of established wisdom to consider and how it can prevent those rash decisions that so often lead to disaster. Look at the impetuousness of youth when it comes to buying cars: doesn't just a little experience help weed out the duds, the rust heaps and oil burners. What about superseded vehicle technology that reappears decades later: multi-leaf spring designs that disappeared from cars in the seventies only to be reintroduced as an essential component on some modern four-wheel drive pick-ups. So, it's not only the secure feeling we get from familiarity that makes us value convention. There is something to be said for proven know-how. Maybe that's why many of us are prone to cling to the past.

Yes, and isn't change often just an illusion of improvement - surely, that's what fashion is, isn't it? It's obvious we have a tendency towards change as much we do towards preservation. More evidence, I suppose, of the moderating balance necessary when renewal is so important. In my own experience, I've seen canal boats made to look like old working boats despite being simply living accommodation for water gypsies - of which, I am so happy to announce, I am one myself. (The water road is like the tarmac road of the fifties: less regulated, less congested, freer.) The modern working boats are actually hire boats – although, to admit to such a view would be sacrilege to many boaters – and 'working boats' are simply privately owned vessels constructed to look like the traditional pliers of trade on the waterways. Some have modern engines, buried below the stern deck; canvas covers, that reveal sumptuous living accommodation; imitation woodwork created by a painting technique called scumbling; and all the modern gizmos – washing machines, showers and a type of flushing toilet - that make life so much easier. They even have fake rivets.

Rivets - those small, domed, thread-less and, with a little help from a hammer, self securing bolts used to join sheets of metal. Although still used in modern fabrication, riveting is a method that was once far more visible than it is today. On the canals, we love to see riveted boats; we think they are quaint, picturesque and unquestionably likable compared to some modern boats; in the same way we view wind turbines as the scourge of the countryside and windmills as as an embodiment of the perfect landscape. Wood and rivets, it would seem, might provide the disguise needed to make new appear old and turn violation into veneration: a cosmetic treatment that will cause people to turn and look instead of turning the other away.

Maybe that is what is needed in the world of trucks, where hostility exists around almost every corner to the presence of such large vehicles on our roads. Instead of concentrating on designs that appeal solely to the operator and driver – those transformer lookalikes or the sleek and shiny modular towers that most tractor unit manufacturers have adopted – what about something a little different? Why not appeal to the public at large in an attempt to make trucks more acceptable? With only a few small changes (and without destroying important aerodynamic shaping) trucks could be made to look more 'old world' and, therefore, more attractive in a traditional sense. Just a bit of Freightliner-like riveting and some fake old Scammell-like wooden coachwork (oh, and a bit of proper sign writing) could turn a juggernaut into a quaint lorry – just like the ones they had in the good old days. And my new laptop? I'll get used to it, of course, and appreciate its new features and faster systems. Soon, I won't be able to live without it.