My Pappy Said..................

"My pappy said son you're gonna drive me to drinkin' if you don't stop drivin' that hot rod Lincoln."

Got The Big Ride back today. What a tumultuous beginning to  a new relationship.

Fell in love with the car, bought it, drove it for a week, then the rear end dropped out. Air suspension failed.

When the air suspension fails you might as well be driving a trampoline on wheels. Practically put my head through the roof.

Gave the car up for a week waiting for parts, got it back today. Feels like starting all over again after a fight with your lover.

I realized that I had not completely accepted the car first time around. I had not given myself over completely to the experience.

Maybe I felt like I didn't deserve it. Maybe it seemed like a silly decision. I drove with one eye on the gas gauge because I was so afraid it would get 3 miles to the gallon. Eight cylinders and all. And the damn thing digitally counts down the miles to empty.

Turns out it gets better mileage than my truck did.

So I never relaxed in the ride. The car sensed it and decided to punish me. I thought about this a lot over the past week.

My thoughts were all over the place. Ranging from I don't deserve the ride to I should have bought something more economical to the evil vibe at The Asylum is so intense it will destroy anything good I bring into my life.

Today I drove out of the dealership for round two and I was flying high. The car and me are one. My mind is exactly where it needs to be. I felt so damn good driving down the road with The Stones Bigger Bang CD rockin' the sound system.

I never once looked at the gas gauge.

The car makes me happy. Not in a greedy materialisitic way, not in  a faux superiority way. The car makes me happy to be driving something nice. To have something nice in my life as a reward for many decades of hard work and sacrifice.

I don't understand happiness. It is a foreign emotion in me.

I am happy around my sons. I am happy around their magical women. When my head is not up my ass I am happy to have my beautiful wife sitting next to me at home every night.

Unfortunately my head is so frequently deeply rooted up my ass that when it is not, it takes my eyes three hours to adjust to the light.

I am happy in the company of my brother.

Other than that, happiness is a foreign experience to me.

You know how you feel when somebody bounces a sixteen pound sledgehammer off the side of your head? You know how it feels when somebody smashes your teeth in with a ballpeen hammer?

That's how happines feels to me. It is shocking. Dizzying. Uncomprehendable.

If this car can take up a little space in my head with happiness and crowd out a piece of the evil stuff, then it really is a good thing.

That's all, man. That's all I really want.

Some outside happiness, a different happiness that I can feel and adjust to as a new experience.

Why not?

Life is one second long. All of us deserve the love of a good family.

All of us deserve just a little more.

I got lucky.