“Hello, my name is Buster McNutt, and I’ve been clunker free for 103 days.”
Yes, I actually went to an addiction control meeting last week. Here in North Central Florida they didn’t exactly have a therapy group strictly devoted to recovering Clunkaholics, so I went to the generic men-with-unhealthy-relationships-with-machines group, which oddly enough meets at a closed down NAPA Car Care Center that is in the process of being converted to a combination bait shop/dreadlock weaving salon.
There were six others in the group. Two had an addiction to pre-1980 John Deere Hay Bailers, one to two-stroke Vespa motor scooters, one to Kenmore garbage compactors, one to anything related to eight-track tape players, and one to vibrating foot massager/shoe shine machines (but then, who wouldn’t?). The only common thread was that we all either had or were trying to kick these addictions, and needed someone to talk us down during those weak moments when we would sell our soul for just one more fix of our personal demon addiction, which in my case, was a mid-’80s Cadillac hearse in a Walmart parking lot, although it should be pointed out that it was not parked in a handicap space, which would have to make you wonder what the driver had gone in to get. I don’t know if it is illegal for a hearse to park in a handicap spot, but I have to believe that out of respect for the possibly departed passenger, nobody is going to say anything, given that death is pretty much considered the ultimate handicap.
After three months of grieving for the Estate Wagon, I was in an advanced state of clunker lust. I felt as though a significant part of my personal floor board had rusted clean through and you could see the ground through a hole in what was left of my soul. I was getting paranoid that people on the street were looking at me and saying to each other, “Oh, there goes that guy who thinks he’s just too good to drive an older, non-collectable car.” I dreaded going to the mailbox, fearing I’d get another anonymous letter containing a partially shredded picture of a vintage station wagon, soaked in red from one of those McDonald’s ketchup packages — they left the empty pack in the envelope, which I sent to the Gilchrist County crime lab, but I never heard anything back — guess they are too busy pouring over the evidence from last winter’s crop circle/cow tipping epidemic.
Lady M was trying her best to cheer me up. She even went as far as to sew a nightgown out of what was left of the Estate Wagon’s rear facing back seat’s seat cover, and then came to bed wearing it, with a dab of 30-weight behind her ear, along with a necklace with the Buick hood ornament suggestively dangling in the front. You can’t put that inside one of those little blue pills!
To take my mind off it, I got a part time job converting old school buses into watermelon buses. You see them everywhere down here, and strange as it might sound, you can’t buy a new one anywhere. There are several styles. The one I was working on simply took out all the windows and seats so you could more easily load and unload the melons. I even got to drive it some, which was a real hoot, because I could turn on the lights, put out the side mounted stop sign, and watch traffic backup — all for a load of melons! People would get upset and call the sheriff’s office, but what good would that do when during season, every third vehicle on the road is a watermelon bus?
I really shouldn’t complain — I do have a 20-year-old S10 pickup, but it just doesn’t have the same clunkerbility rating as a 1986 Estate Wagon. Pickups are great for what they do, but as personal statement-making transportation devices, they are somewhere between merely boring and “hurry up and strap me on the gurney, and stick the needle in my arm” depressing. Nowhere on the window sticker of a new or used pickup will you see a checkmark in the “Character” or “Woo-Hoo!” boxes. Anyone can drive a pickup truck and around here most people do. They have the collective WOW-factor of a toenail clipping, presence or lack of fungus notwithstanding.
No, I fear there is another clunker in my future, even though I know it is about as practical as buying another case of original Old Spice bar soap on the Internet. I’ll be lucky to make 200 days of clunker freedom, but that is my goal. I’ll keep attending the meetings, even though the garbage compactor guy is starting to weird me out. He actually does imitations of the different sounds the compactor makes depending on the type of garbage you put in it — he thinks there is room for a game show here.Vanna White will never have to retire just because she can no longer flip the heavier letters.
But the main thing is to pace myself and not let the addiction-control get too successful too soon. There is a decent chance I can get cured and give up my lust for clunkers eventually. But I’m not ready to send out those vibes just yet. I’m thinking physical therapy might be in order. Like maybe, oh, I don’t know, maybe a few more sessions with the seat-cover negligee, 30-weight perfume and dangling hood ornament necklace wearing therapist?
Recovery — it’s a process, man, it’s a process.
