Me and Brotha Trucka
The joy of road-trippin' with a good friend
Today I’m taking off for Lake Tahoe, California with a good friend. This good friend is dependable, always there for me, a good-time dude who for as long as I’ve known him has started up every time, without fail, every single time I turn the key.
This morning when I walk out to the driveway, beep open the door, slide into the driver’s seat and turn on the ignition, Brotha Trucka is going to start right up, ta-da!, without my foot touching the pedal. That is the kind of confidence I have in one of my favorite BFFs.
Aretha sang about how she was looking for a “do right, all night man.” She should have looked up my friend Brotha Trucka. He would have performed for her. He does for me, all the time.
Let’s get the details out of the way. 2004 Toyota Tacoma. A little guy, comparatively speaking, built in Fremont, California at what is now a Tesla plant. It was made before Toyota started putting the awesome Tacoma line on steroids and muscling it up. Nevertheless, its V-6 has plenty of what it takes to climb mountain grades like what we’re gonna see today rolling through Emigrant Gap and up and over Donner Pass. He’ll do that without breaking a sweat.
Even so, I like to encourage him. Pat him on the dash, tell him he’s doing a good job, keep it coming, brotha. It’s worked so far. The odometer reads 269,098 and there’s no sign of him letting up yet. When I tell the mileage to Toyota people or just people who know vehicles, they’ll say, “That’s nothing. That’s just a baby. Those Tacos, they go 400,000, 500,000, easy.”
Tacomas are called “Tacos” by some for obvious linguistic reasons. I call mine Brotha Trucka because he’s like a brotha to me and he keeps truckin’ “like the do-dah man.” “Brother Trucker,” my first name for him, was too formal, too country club. He runs the streets, right? His name has got to be more street.
I bought him in 2020 in the first summer of Covid. I was going lockdown crazy out of my mind and needed a vehicle of my own to clear out of town.
The original owner was a middle-aged surfer who drove it all over the coast and Baja, an Endless Summer sort of thing. But he has a family and a good job now, and he could no longer chase waves like he used to, so he grudgingly gave it up. It was a hard decision. It meant a lot to him.
It had over 240,000 miles when I bought it. It was a. hard decision for me too, buying a vehicle with that many miles on it, but I overcame my qualms and paid $3,000 for it. Then I sank another $2,300 into it for new tires, new brakes, front struts, rear shocks, drive belts—the whole works. I asked my mechanic after he finished the job if there was anything left that needed to be done. “No, man,” he said. “You hit a home run.”
That’s what it feels like to me, four years later. After year one I got rid of the rack that was used to carry surfboards and bought a new Leer truck top that allows me to lay a bag down in the back and spend the night. The only problem is when it rains. Drips of water seep into the small spaces where the rear window folds down to meet the tailgate. My first night in it I got caught in the middle of a storm in Castle Crags near Mount Shasta. After a night of hard rain I spent the morning drying my sleeping bag out.
This is the first vehicle I’ve ever owned that I’ve given a name. I have a friend in LA who names all his cars. He gives them female names. One of them was named Doris, I think. Name your car Doris and you really do deserve to be ridiculed.
I used to think naming your vehicle was stupid. With Brotha Trucka, I’ve changed my mind. There are two main reasons for this. One: A middle-aged fellow with 270,000 miles under his belt deserves to be addressed with respect. He no longer should be regarded as some anonymous factory product who only goes by the manufacturer’s brand.
The second reason for my attitude change is more romantic. Cowboys name their horses, right? A vehicle, especially the truck, is the modern horse. Roy Rogers and Trigger, the Lone Ranger and Silver, Don Quixote and Rocinante. All of them named their horses. Why not name your truck?
Lots of famous people have famously named vehicles. A few weeks ago we were visiting California’s Central Coast and took a side trip through the desolate inland terrain where James Dean, the legendary 1950s movie star, was killed in a car crash. He called his go-fast 1955 Porsche Spyder “Little Bastard.” He was behind the wheel of Little Bastard when he and another driver collided at high speed.
My guess is that ever since that terrible tragedy, nobody in the vehicle world will ever call their car by that name. My advice is that if you’re thinking about naming your car, go on the lighter side. Be complimentary.
The writer Henry Miller would agree with that. He was no car guy, his mechanical knowledge extended as far as turning on the ignition. Still, as he wrote in “Automotive Passacaglia,” he believed strongly that if you take care of your car, it will take care of you. I’m the same way. It’s a spin on the golden rule of treating your neighbor as you would yourself. Treat your truck as if you were your truck and how you would like to be treated.
Me and Brotha Trucka—we’re family. We survived an End of Days thunder and lightning storm in the Black Hills of South Dakota. We passed along the Gallatin River from Bozeman to Big Sky on a road so beautiful it was an honor to drive it. We also backed into two trees—one in the Sierra foothills near Placerville, the other in Lassen National Park. Boondocked in the sand dunes of the Mojave, explored the Extraterrestrial Highway, and crossed the barren wilds of Navajo Nation. We’ve rolled down the windows, let the wind blow back our hair, and let those two lanes take us anywhere…
No, wait. That was Springsteen who did that. Do you think he gives names to his Teslas and BMWs? Maybe. Look out Tahoe City, here we come! Me and Brotha Trucka are headed your way!
Got a got vehicle naming story you’d like to share? Send it on! KevinNelson@Substack.com.
Our friend Ron’s beloved white Porsche was named Blanche. I always loved that!