Edwards 3rd Annual Cars & Coffee

It’s been awesome getting out to these early events every so often. Usually I’m a ghost, I’ll say Hi to the few people I recognize then get to walking around – capture a few images – all while thinking about what the heck I’m going to write. Ok, that last part is a lie, I don’t really know what I’ll be writing about till I’m actually here putting things together. BUT, lately I’ll stop at a car to really give it a good look over and I’ll usually strike up a conversation with the owner. After all, none of these cars that end up on here mean anything at all without some sort of story between them and the owner.

Edwards Abstract and Title Company hosted their 3rd annual event this past weekend, and though I’m sure they would have hoped for some better weather – the turnout was great. These guys have been locally owned and operating out of the RGV since the late 1800s…I’m not even kidding. It’s always great seeing more local businesses getting involved in hosting events for the automotive community in this sort of capacity. If nothing, all most of us want is a chill place to hang out to see what else is out there driving the streets or hidden away for gatherings like this. It was great seeing the usual suspects parked out there and catching up with an old buddy who had a vehicle on here featured way back when, and I’m pretty excited to be featuring his latest build pretty soon! But my take away from this gathering was realizing what it is that has sort of changed or shifted in the automotive community (in some cases). I talked to the owner of the light blue late 40’s Chevy truck that’s pictured in the title photo for this article. The truck was pretty awesome, it had some reworked interior, we talked about him refreshing the paint, and then we talked about the 5.3 engine swap he had. “I didn’t swap that in myself haha, I don’t know anything about any of that stuff!” and we had a good laugh about it because hey, who cares? It was nice to hear someone be completely ok with just saying they didn’t know how to do something and had no problem admitting they had someone else get it done for them. Nothing about the truck was over done, he talked about wanting to keep the chrome because HE has always liked the look. He talked about the interior being comfortable because HE has to be the one driving it all the time as a daily. Aside from the fact that cars and modifying these cars costs way more than it did when I started – it doesn’t have to be about doing it for anyone else but yourself. Everyone wants to chase the high horsepower numbers, or throw on the widest fenders just to say that’s their builds “thing”. My generation was spoiled by the days of forums and basically no social media. Sure if you built something weird you’d get flamed for it, but I feel like that was a better option than say posting up your car on Instagram, getting 10 likes, and feeling like you’re “doing it wrong”. Here in the RGV though, at least for now, it hasn’t become that serious of an issue where you dont have people attending meets for nothing more than patting themselves on the back and not venturing out to see any of the other cars there. I’ll end things with a quote, but also thanks to everyone who attends these meets and is a positive impact on the local car community.

“Social Media has changed from a way just to express who we are as an individual into catering our content into ways that make us seem better, or smarter, or faster than what we really are.” – Alex Martini

Thanks again to the host – go check’em out!
Edwards Abstract and Title Co.

————————————–
Words and Photos By : Bobby Villarreal