I was born in 1960 and I keenly remember the 1973 oil embargo. (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_oil_crisis) Almost overnight, gas prices rose to a national average of 55 cents/gallon ($2.97 in 2015 dollars). I wasn't living on Oahu then, but I'm pretty sure that gas prices were higher than the national average.
One of the symptoms of that gas-deprived era was that any driver or pedestrian felt entitled to stomp over to your (small) vehicle and engage you in a discussion of your driving habits. Woe unto you if your car was idling a moment longer than necessary in a driveway or parking lot. If you were conning a
supertanker Cadillac El Dorado instead of a subcompact you might even find yourself being yelled at for causing the energy crisis, let alone having your door keyed. This reflexive behavior was
beaten ingrained deeply into my psyche, and even more than four decades later when my car is idling I can still hear my parents yelling "Shut off that engine!!"
This attitude backlashed badly when we bought a Prius and our daughter learned to drive. As a young engineer in training, she read that the 2006 model runs its engine for 45 seconds at startup to warm up the catalytic converter-- whether the car is moving or not. As a teen, she was also rightfully terrified of Hawaii's laws against using mobile devices while driving. She developed the personal habit of getting in the car, turning on the power to the ignition, and then sitting there getting organized. She'd plug in her iPhone, adjust the playlist and the car radio's volume, don her sunglasses, and set up her map or whatever else she'd need for the drive. She seemed to be totally able to ignore the car running its engine for that 45 seconds while she got ready, and of course I felt that the car should be moving down the street. She'd respond that it was less than an ounce of gas and that she'd only raise the Prius' fuel economy from 60 mpg to 60.01 mpg, but I stuck to my guns on the principle of relentless optimization. As we did so often during the teen years, we eventually agreed to stop yelling at each other.
So today I was at White Plains Beach, putting my longboard back into that same Prius, when the car next to me (a beat-up Dodge Neon) started its engine. We were both parked under a tree in the shade, and it was the typical beee-yootiful day in Hawaii nei-- maybe 75 degrees with a nice tradewind breeze. Great weather to be out in the open, perhaps sitting under a shady palm tree or an awning, enjoying the scenery.
Like many cars driven by the island's young adults, that Neon has a loud performance muffler and custom alloy wheels. Sure enough, the people in the front seats had to be younger than my adult daughter and maybe in their teens. But they didn't turn on the engine to leave the parking lot. They didn't turn on the engine even to set up their cell phones and their playlists before leaving. No, they turned on the engine to cool the car with their air conditioning while they sat inside, far from the beach scene. Both of them were riveted to their phones and texting away, completely oblivious to Hawaii's balmy weather and ocean activity going on outside their (closed) windows.
My 1970s psyche roared in pain, my parents were being channeled in stereo on both sides of my cerebral cortex, my own parental reflex synapses were arcing in overload. I had to bite my tongue to keep from knocking on their windows to enlighten them on their fuelish behavior.
Because after all, dude, gas is only $3/gallon. What the heck was my problem?