My Royal Enfield is a door to the past

A 1955 door handle makes me happy every time I see it. 

 If I analyze my devotion to Royal Enfield motorcycles, it comes down to being someone who enjoys things that take me back to his childhood in the 1950s. More interested in the past than the present, I just plain like vintage things. 

It doesn't hurt that Royal Enfield's new motorcycles are pleasant to look at, competent and attractively priced. But, of course, I am thinking here mostly of my 1999 iron barrel Royal Enfield Bullet. 

My Royal Enfield satisfies my nostalgia. It is a 1999 iteration of a motorcycle that could have been built in 1955. 

Yet I am not sated. 

My wife wants a new front door for the house. The present front door has been greeting visitors since the house was built, in 1955, and it shows its age. 

The door-and-window salesman who came out to look at it agreed with her. 

I think I moaned. 

"My husband loves old things," my wife explained. 

I elaborated: the old door has a lovely (to my eye) fluted door handle, with its own lock. 

"Well, you could get something that wasn't pitted," the salesman said. He practically guffawed. 

"Pitted?!" I exclaimed. "That's patina." 

Of course the old-fashioned screen door, with its hook-and-eye lock would have to go too. And the new door could not have a slot for the mailman to put the mail through (that wouldn't meet hurricane standards, I suppose).

The salesman knew (they all do) to address his pitch to my wife. Left to my preferences, nothing would ever change.

We're due to go to his showroom to pick out the new door. I'll go along.

But, after that, I'm going for a motorcycle ride.