HOW TO BUY A USED CAR

Exhaust yourself by driving around for three hours in your old car. The car you have come to hate. By this time you are in the mind frame of "any car will do." You are supple, vacant, Zen-like in your approach to how the river of life flows. Drive to West Hills Honda and park your Volkswagen Beetle. The one you can't handle. The one you've had for four years and you still can't figure out where the front or back begins or ends. In other words, you are zoned out and It Is Time.

Struggle to get out of the car, grab your purse and limp up the hill to a line of four young men who look like they would eat wombat balls if only you would meet one of their eyes. You look at one of them and say, "I don't know how to do this."

They positively shiver in delight.

Really. You can feel the ground move.

You know you have made, by this time, possibly four or five big mistakes while telling the truth. You don't know how to do this. Life no longer has any room for truth. Life is a game, damn it, when will you LEARN this?

One man, name of Frank, herds you away from the rest. Frank wears thick glasses and is not, like the rest of the guys, sweating. He says, "It's easy!" He doesn't yet know what it is I want to do, and it's easy. I like his attitude, kind of devil-may-care. Kind of Mary Poppins Meets Harpo Marx. Heido Ho! It's Easy!

We go inside and sit down at Frank's desk. He wants to know what I do for a living. I tell him I'm a psychologist. Frank's major interest seems to be Frank. He leans back in his chair, gathering some kind of points. "Well, now," he says, "roll your chair over here," and tell me what you can tell about me."

"You suffer from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder," I say. "Yep, sure do!" he says, happily. "You're divorced, and you have one or two children," I say. "One," he says, "Oh boy, you're good," he says. "You drink too much," I say. "Hey," he frowns," how do you know that?" "I can smell it on your breath, Frank," I say.

He straightens up. "I'll have to watch that," he says. "Now. What can I do for you?"

"I want to trade in my 2007 red Volkswagen Beetle," I say. "For something inexpensive like a Kia or a Hundea."

Frank happily slaps one of the perfectly placed pieces of paper on his desk. "We can DO that!" He says. "We can DO that! Come on and let's go find some Kias and Hundeas for you to look at and drive! You're gonna love this!"

Frank's small eyes are blinking fast. He may have some kind of tic that I missed mentioning, I don't know. He certainly does have an ability to go from down to up in a New York second, all that money.

We walk around a big curve and end up in Kia and Hunda-ville. I climb inside a cool looking jet black Kia. It's nice Chic. The motor sounds a little fast. I drive it around the area and decide against it. I love the look but am sorry about the motor sound. "I don't think so, Frank," I say.

"Oh, we've got LOTS of cars," Frank says.
"I know you do, Frank, I looked them up on the computer, last night." He didn't seem to cotton to this information, I don't know why. I drove the Hundea but the wheel was a bit jerky and I didn't like it as much as I thought I would, either. As we were parking the Hundea my eyes lit on a nice looking red car. Too long? Too sleek for the likes of me?

A 2010 Nissan. With my trade I could have it for $4,000. I drove it around, the motor sounded good, it felt right, I liked it. What more should I know? "I'll take it," I said.

"I'll take it," I said.

And so I did.

After an hour and a half of signing forms which is one of the things I most hate in life (you're credit is excellent, your mileage is low so we'll knock off...., do you want the this, do you want the that, you have one more year of waranty left on this Nissan....), I paid my money and drove it home.


Later, I called Alan and said "I bought a car.
Silence.
"A 2010 Nissan."
Silence, then, "Did you ask questions about it?"
"You mean about the price?"
"No, I mean about who owned it before?"...."Or.....anything?"
"Well, the people who owned it before didn't want it anymore and so they took it to West Hills and traded it in."
Silence. Then,"Good luck."
"What?"
"I said 'Good luck'."

It's not easy being me. It's not easy being a car that belongs to me. How I ever even got to the ripe old age I am sometime just floors me. How I ever made my way into the professional world and delivered all those lectures I used to deliver and taught all those classes around the U.S. and got all those degrees......I mean, I was the same me then as I am now....how the hell did I do it?

"And I shall easy to be", said Emerson. Well, yeah, it's pretty easy to be me, too, or at least it feels like it, until I get next to other people and they explain to me the Right way to do things, or, indeed the Only way to do things.....but if it really were the ONLY way, then I wouldn't really BE here, would I? My father used to suggest that all of this (he's wave his arms) was just a dream, HIS dream, as a matter of fact, and that I was simply a part of his dream. It was only when he died that I could truly let my breathe completely go (I was thirty-four by then) and absolutly know down deep inside that he had NOT constructed me through his dreams. I was me. I existed all by myself.

And so does that beautiful 2010 red Nissan sitting down in my garage. I know where it's front is. I know where's back is. I know where it's sides are. It's longer than the Beetle was but at least I CAN SEE WHERE I BEGIN AND END.

Which is a good thing.

Please, y'all. PLEASE. Wish me good luck.