Mater

When I first suggested making Mater to my 7 year old for the Mid-Autumn Festival
He gave me that Mom-you-must-be-kidding look

I guess it must be a pretty uncool idea
for a 7 year old to be walking around carrying a rusty tow truck

Doesn’t matter if he is the world’s best backwards driver
or if he is cleverly handcrafted with recycled junk

So we made Doc Hudson for him instead (McQueen was more for his younger brother)

Now the festival is over
but I have decided to make Mater anyway
just to make myself happy

Cos he’s my favourite character in the movie
the heart and soul of the town
the funniest guy
the honest and loyal friend

His accent reeks of familiarity and nostalgia
It brings back my first memories of the United States from almost 20 years ago

It’s where I discovered country music
It’s where I learned that communication between 2 supposedly ‘English’ speaking people can totally breakdown because of different slang

When Singlish meets Redneck
It’s hilarious
It’s embarrassing

and because Mater is old and worn
it is more forgiving when doing paint job for him

It needn’t be impeccable nor flawless
in fact, it looks more ‘Mater’ when the colours are smudged

So I ended up mixing blobs of paint to ‘distress’ the colours
which turned out to be pretty therapeutic

Even more so when I had this, this and this playing in the background
I felt like being transported to some Dixie old towns

I am so gonna grab hold of some Brad Paisley’s CDs after this !