The normal hubbub of a rock station, clanking weights and smack-talking among The Buffed Ones at the gym was interrupted by a car alarm--loud enough that I could hear it through noise-cancelling headphones and a Wine Library TV podcast. One of the guys strolled outside to check out the source, and turned back with an incredulous grin: "Who puts an alarm on a Harley?" he asked all in general and no one in particular.
Good question.
Yes, I realize that edginess--provided not a fad, anyway--invariably creeps to the muddling center. The problem is that buying a motorcycle so pricey that its owner needs the "grown up" insurance policy of an alarm runs 180 degrees counter to the leathers and doo-rag cachet that rides the fumes and road-dust behind these symbols of freedom. Bourgeois meets badass. Not unlike the most die-hard-core fanboys/fangirls camping out--in costume and full regalia--in front of the most banal surburban mall cineplex imaginable.
Marketers and brand-builders know quite well that what they're selling and what you're buying can be two different things. And as much as I champion the notion of the informed consumer, "informed" probably can't reach its full potential without some self-awareness. Where do rent/mortgage payments blur into "club dues" for the neighborhood? Where does the grocery list blur into weight control or keeping one's diet "pure" (of additives, GMOs, high-carbon footprints, factory farming, deforestation, etc.)? Where do the widgets on a new gadget take a back seat to its cool factor?
In one sense, it's cheering to think that we can imagine many purchases as a two-for-one deal. Perhaps sometimes even do better than a mere two-fer. (E.g.: You're buying a bag of coffee beans aaaaand they're organic, shade-grown and traded fairly--so you're also buying a better world, and maybe even sticking it to The Man besides. A 24-cube of Coke can't do those tricks. Just sayin'.)
That's where the afore-mentioned self-awareness comes in, meaning the forethought to ask oneself: "What am I really buying here?" Coolness? Comfort? Change?
Good question.
