A friend of mine in town here that is in his 40s and that raced BMX lives by himself in a house full of bicycles. He called me up the other day and we were talking about this stuff.
He said how old BMX bicycles were going way up in price just like classic motorcycles. He saw a set of NOS BMX handlebar grips sell on Ebay for over $900 recently! We talked about hipsters, posers and wannabees and what makes somebody one.
The final thought was that someone does not have to have to have been there to legitimately be involved with vintage BMX bikes now, but they have to love the machinery and love riding BMX and BMX history. If they are just someone with extra money buying up old BMX bikes so they have something to show off with, if they are trying to buy credibility or cool, then they are on the wrong road.
Same with motorcycles or anything else I would say. The world needs each generation to be interested in history, not just of motorcycles etc. but all history so what is good can be preserved and what was lame is not repeated. The world also needs people who do what they do every day out of love and passion for whatever they are involved in, everything should be art. And art is not confined to what the eye sees, it can be how well a bicycle, skateboard or motorcycle has been put together and runs, because it was put together out of love and passion for the machinery and it's history.
So when I get my panties in a bunch I hope it is because I see someone polluting the world by doing something for shitty reasons, to get rich, for attention etc.. Go ahead and be a mechanic for money, but you better love your job and do it right instead of doing it half-assed so you can take the money and run while screwing other people over and misrepresenting things.
To me a hipster is someone that jumps from trend to trend adopting and copping the aesthetics of legitimate eras and movements for destructive reasons, selfish reasons. It is an over-developed self.
I don't want to live in a world full of hipsters, I want to live in a world full of people that love the outside world and other things at least as much as they love themselves, and I don't care what their chronological age is.
If there is one thing I have to watch about myself, it is that when I point out what bothers me in the world I have to do it more carefully so that it looks like I am trying to do something good an not just coming across as someone just trying to make waves for the sake of it. I am still learning about myself and the world, that can never stop.