Requiem for a Prius

I know.  I know.  Here's me with all my tooled-up Western website, my Texan schtick, my still-not-as-wide-as-the-barn-door-behind-me rustic author photo... and I'm just gonna come out and say it: I drive a Prius. 

*saloon piano music stops; hard-eyed stares commence*

Not sorry.  Around here, we like our Dr. Pepper, our big-ass belt buckles, and our even bigger-ass trucks... but I tell you what, that sweet white futuristic road-suppository was the best car I ever had.

Had, as in past tense.  It's dead now.  Insurance company declared it a total loss.  And I get why, after the Incident. $9000+ to resurrect a seven-year-old car with over 135,000 on it just doesn't add up. 

But man, I am just all kinds of cut up about it.  I LOVED that freaking car.  Delivered pizza in it (and boxes of thawing chicken parts, and more sheet cakes than I can count).  Drove back from the casino at 2 AM with a cute drunk girl puking down the side of it.  Spent the night in it.  Always took it in real regularly for all its services and tune-ups and what-not.  And I tell you what: in all those hundred-thousand miles I had it, it never once left me on the side of the road.

To be clear: I'm not one of those people who gives their cars names and genders and personalities and all that.  It's still just the white Prius in my mind.  But man.  I TOTALLY GET how people get attached to their rides - shoot, to their toys and keepsakes and inanimate objects of whatever kind.  It's almost like, the less actual mind and personality something has, the easier it is for you to imprint your own thinking on it.

You know what I mean?  There's all manner of classes and therapy and daytime TV programs invested in helping you to tolerate the well-formed proclivities of the intelligent hominid you married (to say nothing of the ones you subsequently progenated).  With little furry friends, you have a bit more room on which to write your mental fan-fiction version of their personalities.  By the time you get down to fish and turtles, you're pretty much stumping the whole thing.

So I guess it's not surprising that we can still see characters in the noble steeds of the 21st century.  Maybe it's kinda hard for your constant adventuring companion to avoid growing a little bit of a soul, whether it's well-gummed teddy bear or a two-ton road warrior.

At any rate, perhaps you will indulge me while I eulogize mine.

Goodnight, sweet Prius.  And flights of angels drive thee to thy rest.