Musings from the left seat

They say you can’t go home again.

Thomas Wolfe wrote that as you go out to make your mark in this world, going back home seems different. Feels different. Shit. It is different. See, you have changed. And it could very well be that the home you remembered changed to. Sometimes, it’s just hard to tell. More often it’s glaring, slapping you in the face with a cold open handed smack. Or in your mind’s eye, it is still that perfect place, exactly how you left it. Where you left it, when you left it behind. But somewhere along the way you and home travelled down divergent paths, never to exactly merge again, no matter how hard you may try.

Life is funny like that. Like the time you ate at a local restaurant and ordered the crispy fried duck wings in chili sauce. Turns out they almost burned the batch by accident, but served them anyway. You took that first bite and it was perfect. Perfect crunch, perfect texture, perfect taste. And you go back to that same restaurant and order that same thing again and again, even asking them to cook them crispy well done. But they never, ever get it right. No, you can’t go home again.

With cars it’s kind of like that too. You keep on looking for that one car over and over. Wanting to relive that perfect moment when you twisted the key for the first time and heard the mid-mounted flat-six motor roar to life. But then you went down a divergent path and sold it. Over time, nostalgia creeps in and you find that you’re longing for it. Beating yourself up for selling it. Then plotting to buy another one to rekindle that lost love. The next one and the one after may be newer, more powerful, have better options, but it will never be the same. It will never be that combination of Arctic Silver and Boxster Red leather interior. No, you can’t go home again.

I am on my forth Boxster. Well fifth actually if you count the Cayman S. I love the new one. Well new to me anyway. It is just a couple of options away from being perfect. But fear not, I will manage, I will solider on. Still that love affair with my first Boxster persists. I remember opening the two garage doors simultaneously and seeing the Boxster sitting side by side with my 930 Turbo Carrera. The Turbo - low and squat and menacing. The Boxster – tightly curved flanks recalling the early glory years of Porsche’s racing past. Wow, did they look good sitting together in the garage. My garage. Had to sell them both. Our paths diverged. No, you can’t go home again.

But damn, the new Speed Yellow Boxster S sitting right now in my garage is sure making a good case for it.

And on that exhaust note -