7:50 a.m. - Wednesday, Mar. 05, 2003
Ms Leslie's Freedom Van
I�m going to miss my old van.
I should have bought a better one a long time ago. I have no idea what, exactly, I was thinking when I plunked down two thousand dollars in cash for a 1982 Chevy van. It was one of those vans that were popular then. It had captains chairs and carpeting everywhere. Big windows for passengers to look out of. A ladder on the back, and a spare tire. You get the idea.
I was still living as a man, and desperate to make some kind of change. Any kind of change. The first thing I did after I bought the van was bid another two thousand dollars on a broken-down old travel trailer on eBay. Surprise! I won! So I drove my van to New York City to get my new old trailer and drag it home, along with the dozen or so members of the mouse family that had lived for several generations inside the wreck. That trailer sat in Ann�s back yard for the next two years until I finally donated it to the Salvation Army. There�s a reason they call me crazy.
It was a waste of money, but not a waste of time. I had time alone for the first time in several years. I got to drive somewhere I had never been. I slept in a hotel one night, but spent the rest of the nights sleeping on the floor of my van in various rest areas or parking lots. I can�t really explain it, but there was something freeing and calming about this risky behavior. It was like reducing life to its lowest common denominator. My PTSD therapist understands. She told me it�s pretty typical behavior for PTSD veterans. Whatever.
Having dropped the trailer in the back yard, I made several other trips in my van. I bought tickets for my ex-wife and granddaughter to fly from Alaska to Seattle and drove the van up there to see my granddaughter. That was good for two or three thousand miles of living in my van, plus a couple of days spent in the hot parking lots of various auto parts stores, making on the road repairs to my heap. After a couple of weeks in Washington, I drove down the coast and visited my mother in San Diego. Then across Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Louisiana back to Mississippi. I became expert at living in the van. Never mind that the A/C crapped out a long time ago. I had an ice chest and a case of Vienna Sausages. I was self-contained, baby.
During the coming year, I made at least six more trips across the south. My sister was in trouble, so I lived with her in California, trying to help her overcome her own financial problems and find a job she could do. Once a month, I would drive back to Mississippi just to make it to VA appointments. I would spend a day or two in Mississippi and then drive back to California. In the meantime, I made the decision to begin coming to terms with my feelings, so I found another therapist in San Diego who was knowledgeable abut gender issues. I began living as a woman on my birthday, September 7th, 2000.
By the time I was ready to come back to Mississippi to stay, it was early December. I had put many miles on the old van. It was smoking and dribbling oil pretty steady. I hoped I could make it to Mississippi just one more time but it was not to be. By the time I got to Yuma, I was replacing oil at the rate of five quarts every fifty miles. A trooper pulled me over and wrote me a fix-it ticket. I knew I wasn�t going to get any further without some major help.
In Yuma, I had a repair shop check it out. It was a weekend, so I ended up spending a couple of nights in the motel six, waiting for them to come to work. Finally, I got the word: A broken ring. Oil everywhere. Suddenly, I was living in a motel in Yuma with a van that was nothing more than junk full of junk.
Try to imagine it: A chunky �woman� with big broad shoulders, a hairy chest and hideous five o�clock shadow that made its appearance long before five, stuck in sunny Arizona with no real prospects for leaving. I used to say it takes a real man to be a woman. My Yuma experience was a good example of it.
Five or six hundred dollars later, the guys at the shop had wired things together enough that they thought I might make it back to San Diego. They made me promise not to try to drive to Mississippi. By the time I pulled to the curb in front of my mother�s home, the van was coated with black oil that had dripped from under and been blown onto the back of it. I was, by then, out of money too.
I stayed with my mother until February, saving money to buy a rebuilt engine for the van. It was expensive but at the time it seemed like the cheapest way out.
I�ve driven the old thing ever since. Still no air conditioning. It makes a funny thumping sound when I go over a bump. It�s hard to start in the morning, and I think it�s only running on seven eighths of its cylinders. But the thing that hasme convinced that it�s time, is that on the way home from New Orleans with Ann and Mike the other day, the charging system crapped out. We drove in a blinding rain, at night, with ever dimming headlights all the way from New Orleans. I don�t see well at night anyway. I wasn�t sure we would make it.
So, that�s it. I don�t have any interest left in working on it, and I�m not going to spend any more money on it. According to some, it no longer fits my image anyway. I hope I can drive it to the store and back a few times before I leave for Thailand. If not, I�ll take a taxi, I guess. And when I get home, I�ll need to start saving for another car. One that DOES fit my image.
I was thinking about a used Lexus. Got any thoughts for me?
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