NATOR ………..
I have no name, for this isn't about me. I am no different than anyone who reads this, have no special skills nor abilities to differentiate myself from any other member here. I just believe in what I do and what I do is trying to spread the word of Nator.
For those interested in the roots of Nator we will have to go back nearly a year, for that is when the movement began. We are all members of MSF and we have all benefited from help through advice, physical action or even humor, I myself joined MSF a little over a year ago and I was only interested in technical information , for my background was musclecars and not computer controlled imports. I was a very inactive member only reading the parts that affected me directly and not much else. One night I discovered shoutbox and I just watched as people chatted , but did not join in for I was intimidated by the prospect of talking to strangers. Eventually I joined and said a word here and there….time passed.
On a particular night in October I noticed the owner of MSF speak to a member about him driving up 70 some odd miles to help him figure out his map clamp problems, I joined the conversation for they were both local to me and was invited to tag along. That night I couldn't join for I had unexpected problems at work and kept me from meeting these future friends. The end result of this quest for help, wasn't successful for the problems were al little more severe than expected. The next day, after finding out that this members car was still inoperable I questioned him about his options and he replied he had none, for he was in bad economical shape…..more or less.
Not long after we figured that for this guy to get his car running he would need a few hundred dollars, I turned to the owner of MSF and said, "hey ….. why don't we start a donation thread for him"….. I threw in $25 myself and he put up $50…. Immediately I put another $25 as to not be outdone. Within a week we had $500 dollars or so and in that same time period this member got his car serviced properly and was up and running again. To me that was the beginning of the concept of Nator, but it did not have a name yet.
Soon there after my help was rewarded back when these two same individuals came over to my house to help me install a FMIC which with all the plastic in this car I surely didn't want to tackle by myself. I was very honored that they would do this for me and without realizing, it would set the blueprint for what Nator has become today…..to me at least. It didn't take long before we started finding out other members in Southern California to either assist or invite to share a few hours on a Sunday.
Maybe a month into this we had four to five regulars that would drop by on Sundays and wrench away at their vehicles, we shared beer , pizza , laughs and other such travesties that I dare not mention. We started to become a group of friends.
Now as to the name…….. well it isn't as intricate as people might think, it doesn't stand for anything performance related, nor some new invention from a laboratory. The name Nator is derived simply from my love of Wendy's Baconator…… nothing more , nothing less. One day in shoutbox one of these 5 friends said to me "what up 'nator"……… and my nickname was born. I must admit I liked it because in reality we all have nicknames at one point or another in our lives.
Months passed and our crew grew, I even threw the original BBQ where we spent from 7am until about 11pm working on cars, eating blood sausages and drinking on my front lawn. We even had a guy from New Jersey join us that day and it was a great honor…… none of us will ever forget that day.
We had some mishaps, in particular one of our friends purchased a downpipe that was sub par quality , forcing him to install it , uninstall it and put the stocker back on, he was devastated. We all gathered around him and encouraged him to demand an immediate refund from the vendor and after a few weeks of an uphill struggle he got his reimbursement. As a group I remember the anger we felt towards that vendor, and we swore to ourselves to not allow events like this go unnoticed like in a lot of vendor owned forums…… that was Nator in it's infancy.
Forwarding months ahead , we had more people join us and in particular one guy that seemed to be more contained than us, but seem to bring some skills and access to a shop. We made friends with him rapidly. He joined "our way"…… the Nator way.
As most of you know, there are vendors of all quality types here and there. Some have come and gone and some have been here from day one. As a group, when not together on Sundays we made a point to be on shoutbox and discuss new parts, install failures and successes etc . Others seemed interested in what we had to say, for we were LOUD and OBNOXIOUS.
We went as far as getting some "suspect" parts to test and when the reality of these parts turned out to be a complete failure as a product, it angered us but we decided to strike back with humor and NATOR PERFORMACE was born. We re welded traction bars, switched bushings on shifters anything to say it was Natorized and the joke was born. Our newest member had the wit to think .."hey…how about I make some decals and we start slapping them on these failures of parts"…… it sounded like the most wonderful idea to me. The name Nator Performance started echoing in shoutbox and it caught on, threads with pictures emerged (done by us of course to both lighten the mood of MSF and to inform the community to watch out for these parts).
Not soon after, we decided to go a step further and paint my Cobb FMIC with a blue NATOR stencil to which I still have on my car to this day, it was an obvious joke for the name Cobb was clearly stamped on the end tanks. I furthered the joke by registering the name Natorperformace.com and the owner of MSF graciously opened up a sort of web page to make it that much more real. I opened up email accounts and anything I could think of as a parody to the countless "scammer vendors" out there. I believe to this day the community appreciated our efforts in shedding light on some suspect vendors.
What does all of this have to do with Nator today?....... it's our heritage, nothing else…simply how we began. Nator has grown in size and it isn't me anylonger nor the joke, it is a concept in yours and my brain. It is what you wish it to be, freedom, friendship or even failure for which we all know it well with this car of ours. I have seen dozens and dozens of people who chant Nator, some understand it and some just want to fit in…… I don't judge, for in the end who does not want to belong to something greater than themselves.
Some of my ideas about what Nator means to me are loosely based on the film Fight Club. Nator does not belong to me, I am not special …. I am you or you or you………… all I want is to belong to a family, like we all do. Nator is at a crossroads right now, are we a joke? A driveway with access to a shop? A t-shirt company? I would like to think we are a group, of what? Should be abort the name and say "fooled you"…. Should be invest in making T-shirts and decals for the people that want to buy them? I can keep asking myself questions and I would never end, for Nator's possibilities are endless.
On August 29th 2009 I will have at my house hopefully 30 people or more , of which I have never laid eyes upon to two thirds of that number. We have two confirmed members coming from Florida and North Carolina . We may also have the honor of having two more guests from out of town, my hands shake at the possibilty of it all. What would drive a person to fly three thousand miles to spend 6 hours with a room full of strangers? Nator is the drive behind this action, there is no profit or anything of monetary value to gain here from either side. But there is one day to remember for the rest of your life and that is worth a lot more to me than a new car part.
We have inspired here in Southern California other regions in Texas, North Carolina and Florida to start their version of Nator, will it be the same? It will be what they want it to be, what they need it to be.
In my heart of hearts I hope to inspire you to begin your quest for Nator for it may lead to one day us meeting each other, and that would be special.
Thank you to MSF and all it's members for letting this dream be.
lenny127