Cohort Pic(k) Of The Day: 1990-94 Chevrolet Lumina — Forgettable Nineties

Photos from the Cohort by Hyperpack. 

Every decade has its memorable moments; events that bring joy, surprise, or shock. On the other hand, every era is filled with plenty of moments that pass you by, without notice.

Of course, the memorable moments are just that; you recall them with ease as they’ve become part of yourself. The others, well, you have to search hard into your mind and struggle to bring them back. For such forgotten moments, an image, a sound, or a smell may be needed as a trigger. Anything to reawaken the senses to remind the brain such a thing occurred.

And the existence of the first-gen. Lumina is such a case with me. Without the help of these images uploaded at the Cohort, I would struggle to recall the car at all. Talk about a bunch of memory cells I –easily– devoted to more important matters back then.

But such are the priorities of the brain, right? Do you want a casual observer to remember your newly released Lumina? Well, if so, this wasn’t quite the shape to leave an impression. Of any kind. Mind you, I’m no casual observer but used to be a Chevy fan in my youth.

Talk about underwhelming…

Just a few days ago, I was talking about being glad to see a first-gen. Ford Escort posted at the Cohort. An average ’80s econo-shape, that my brain cells did recall –with ease.

The sight of the car brought back some long-gone memories and filled in some blanks from my teen days. Somehow, the little car felt like it had been part of my previous life.

But this Lumina? I actually had to Google in search of period ads to see if anything triggered any memories. Bingo! This Disney ad appeared! A rather common one I remembered from my college days.

Just one important issue, however. I recalled everything about the ad, except the car.

The Lumina has been labeled a Deadly Sin at CC on more than one occasion. And rightly so. That such a disposable shape arrived to replace Chevy’s long-running Celebrity to face the likes of the Taurus and the Camry is all the more damning.

“Where’s the Light?” was Paul’s title for his Deadly Sin Lumina piece. And indeed, this Lumina’s Lumina badge seems to agree. It has faded almost to the point of non-existence.

Maybe my little recollection of the Lumina relates to my living in California during the 1990s. Probably. After all, looks like most Luminas that arrived to the Golden State did so solely to fleets.

In any case, I’m sure some CC readers out there will tell of these being decent daily transport, etc. Which I guess they were. A point in favor. Or two. And I’ll admit that it’s remarkable when an unremarkable car such as this survives in this condition to this day. But for this fan-boy of Chevy’s better days, as nice as this old Lumina is, I’ll do my best to leave any memory of it in the past.

 

Related CC reading:

Curbside Classic: 1991 Chevrolet Lumina Euro — GM’s Deadly Sin #18 — Where’s The Light?

Curbside Classic: 1997 Chevrolet Lumina — GM’s Deadly Sin #28 — The Re-gifter