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When our son arrived, we made the decision
to keep the truck until she died to save money.
With only 215,000 miles on her, she was
good-to-go for at least another 100,000 with proper
maintenance and good care. Of course, her
age would be mean no more trips to the Rockies,
but I figured we'd get a new truck before
that issue came up in 2015 or 2016. Well,
things
didn't exactly work out that way...
The final chapter of RGX I was written in
June 2014. On a Friday evening I was heading home
from work, with a planned stop to get
some chicken wings for dinner. On the Hardy Toll Road
just north of FM 1960, I hit some
traffic and stopped. Glancing in the rear view mirror I saw a
lesser evolved member of the species
about 300 feet back coming at me with alarming speed.
It quickly became apparent that this
drooling idiot had no intention of stopping. In fact, the
brakes were never touched and the car
was doing at least 50, maybe 60. I had enough time to
appreciate what was about to happen,
but not enough time to move out of the way (which
would have been pretty unfair to the guy in
front of me). I pushed the brake pedal to the floor
and sat back in the seat. The wait wasn't
very long...
BANG!
The impact knocked me almost completely
from my seat and pushed the truck sideways about
35 degrees. It also shoved me
about 10 feet into the car in front of me, but I just kissed his
bumper. Hardly a scratch. After a
quick assessment to ensure I was intact, I jumped out
with the intention of tearing this idiot
a new one. However, when I saw that it was a "her," I
cooled off a bit. Then, I
looked at her car... and was amazed she got out of it at all. She was
completely unhurt... which
figures. The terminally stupid are usually lucky like that.
Her excuse was that she was sneezing.
I'm calling BS on that excuse and it looked like the
Trooper felt the same way. My
guess is she was on her phone. In any case, she got the
blame for the wreck.
I remain eternally grateful that
Michele and our infant son, Noah, were safely at home
that night. I shudder to think
what the impact would've done to them.
Initially it looked like my ol' truck
would pull through this. The bumper was bent and the bed
was bowed up, but it looked
fixable. Further inspection revealed the frame was bent about
40 degrees between the rear axel and
bumper. No way to fix that. The ol' gal had made
her last trip to Narrow Gauge
Country. We limped home that evening... our final trip together.
She was a dang good truck, as evidenced
by this webpage. Her last act was saving my life!
Two weeks before the wreck, her final mission was to bring our son, Noah, home from the
hospital
after 26 days in the NICU. His first ride in a truck was the last special trip I needed
her to
perform... and I find that very fitting.
So long my friend... and thank you. |
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