Road trips

When I was a child our car was a red 1952 MG TD.
It was only used sporadically in the summer and I distinctly remember driving with my parents to the beach. 3 children sitting on the wooden bench in the back, clutching our swimming gear and my sisters long hair being whipped around by the wind, battering my face the whole trip.
During the oil crisis in the mid seventies it was stored away until one day my brother and his equally mechanically minded friends got it started and drove round the neighbourhood till my dad found out and blew a gasket.
Shortly after my brother passed away from leukaemia.
My parents later found the money to have the car restored and after I got my drivers license I would occasionally take it out for a drive, filled with equal measures of exhilaration and absolute terror that it would break down somewhere awkward, as it was prone to do.
The car has now been sold to my much older cousin who owns a handful of them already as a result of childhood event involving my dad, the MG and being dropped off in the middle of nowhere for being very obnoxious.
To this day I love car trips and as my wife shares my enthusiasm our holidays are often based around driving somewhere.
Our cars, are if nowhere as charming and unique, a lot more comfortable and reliable.
But, whenever I see an old MG TD on the road, usually driven by a retired engineer type, I always feel a twinge of envy of the wonderful feeling it gives you, embarassment over being mechanically talentless and unworthy of such a car, and pure relief that I am not behind the wheel of it.