How Can You Not Be Romantic About An Old Rusty Truck Almost Ruining Your Life?

You ever need something so badly it scares you to say it aloud, just because the universe might smell that stench of desperation about you and smite your ass back into the existential garbage time you deserve? The way I’ve been feeling about living in New York City qualifies. When I said goodbye to Lauren Theisen last summer, it was crushing. I had seen that sublime summit and would now regress back to the place I regrettably called home. There is, as it turns out, a reason why writers love New York, and my apartment in Tacoma would have given Julian of Norwich seasonal depression. I knew I had to get back no matter what, but as I’ve documented, my constitution is ill suited for the ‘or bust’ suffixes of life.

Luckily, life decided to rub my nose in just how shitty stagnancy smelled. My apartment’s toilet exploded sewage everywhere, wafting the Tacoma aroma upon all of my belongings. In case I hadn’t yet gotten the message, my lazy scummy dirtbag fuckface of a property manager decided this was the right time to raise the rent, supplying me the ample spite that would spur the big move. No time like the present. I needed to get rid of everything I could stomach one day buying again, find every latent dime I was owed or could borrow, and claw my way back to the only city really worth getting bled dry to live in. Most importantly, I needed to sell the Lexus.

In 2004, my uncle made one of the smartest calls that anyone ever got to make on the car market: He bought a brand new Lexus GX 470. It was eye-wateringly expensive, about 80 grand in today’s money, but his construction business was going well, and anyway in his judgment it was sturdier and more comfortable than anything else he test drove. He fucking nailed that one. This was Toyota engineering at the absolute peak of their powers. That GX was no steal, but at few points in history has a family of cars been so utterly far ahead of the competing options in terms of quality as the Toyota SUVs of this era.