Dad's CRV of Theseus

Dad always had an interesting relationship with his cars.

When I was very young, he drove the quintessential hippie wagon: a Volkswagen Bus. He would load his magic show into it, which back then was a bulky affair consisting of large, traditional props - a Zig-Zag illusion, sawing a woman in half, and all the other oversized equipment that went along with a full-scale stage show. The poor thing was constantly breaking down, and I have vivid memories of watching dad unleash torrents of obscenities while attempting to work on the engine, which slid out of the back of the van on a rack.

Despite all of this (or perhaps because of it) the Volkswagen Bus somehow sparked a lifelong love for the model. He always wanted another one, and even modeled his mailbox to look like a Volkswagen Bus.

Later came a gray Oldsmobile with a manual transmission, which sparked another lifelong affection: Dad loved driving a stick shift. This particular car also provided him with one of his better stories. While driving to see me around 1992 or so, he hit a patch of ice and crashed into the side of a cliff. He struck his head on the rearview mirror and tore open part of his face above his eyebrow. The resulting scar remained with him for the rest of his life.

Of course, that wasn't the story he always told.

To audiences, the scar was the result of a bullet-catch routine gone wrong.

By the late 1990s -around my senior year of high school - dad was on his second of four marriages. He had married into a well-to-do family, which meant the days of buying busted-up used clunkers were over. On one of my visits to see him, I noticed there was a brand-new 1998 Honda CRV sitting in his driveway.

I didn't think much of it at the time.

Little did I know that this would become the penultimate Riggsmobile: the car he would drive for nearly thirty years, the vehicle that would carry him through an enormous portion of his life, and ultimately, the last car he would ever own.

That little red CRV would eventually become just as much a part of dad's story as magic, mentalism, cats, books, or anything else. There were countless adventures in what I came to call the CRV of Theseus which faithfully conveyed us to and fro for nearly three decades. And, like so many things associated with John Riggs, it would have a story all its own.

I am sure most of you are familiar with the philosophical question known as the Ship of Theseus, but for anyone who isn't, the basic question goes something like this: If a ship sets out on a long journey and, over the course of that journey, every single piece of the ship is eventually replaced, is it still the same ship that originally left? It is an old question about identity, continuity, and what exactly makes something the thing that it is. We will come back to this later.

Around the time the CRV of Theseus made its appearance, Dad really began to expand his performing career, branching out from local and regional shows to traveling across the country. He began doing college tours booked through APCA and toured with mentalist/hypnotist Sam Hawley, a.k.a. Marc Psiman. Dad drove that little CRV across the country and back, crisscrossing the United States in pursuit of the next show. I have no idea how many miles he put on the thing during those first few years of ownership, but it was a lot.

Then, in 2003, I had a major life crisis - one that dad saved me from, for which I am eternally grateful to him. I came to live with him for a while, hoping to recover and convalesce. Of course, any such plans are always snatched from the hands of anyone named Riggs by a cackling, vengeful God.

During that same period, dad's mother - my Grandma - passed away, and around the same time his marriage fell completely apart. Instead of the quiet period of recovery I needed, dad and I suddenly found ourselves trying to figure out how we were going to get out and make it on our own.

And so, in what would be a recurring theme, we made our escape in the little red CRV, loaded down with every piece of dad's life we could possibly cram into it.

Dad and I moved into a little apartment which is worth several blog posts of its own. When we moved in, we had to bypass police tape because there had been a murder in one of the adjoining domiciles. Many interesting stories came from this period which maybe I will share in the future. More pertinent to this story, though, is the fact that in the ensuing divorce dad was forced to pay for the CRV - a provision he fervently lamented as according to him, he was the one who had paid for it to begin with. Long story short - dad paid for the CRV twice. It was then he vowed he would get his money's worth out of her.

Living with dad during this period was one of the happiest times of my life. We had fun, he focused on rebuilding his career, and we helped each other get back onto solid mental footing. In many ways, after everything that had happened, it felt as though the two of us were finding our way again. Eventually, dad began talking to a woman who lived in Bloomington, Indiana, and before long he was regularly driving the CRV back and forth to see her. It was around this time that the CRV of Theseus really began to show her age and to earn her name.

Dad eventually made the woman in Bloomington Wife #3 and moved up there to be with her. The day he packed up and left was one of the saddest days of my life. Of course, dad being dad, he drove down to visit me often, and the little red CRV carried him safely back and forth between Bloomington and Tennessee.

By this point, however, breakdowns were beginning to become a recurring theme. The idea of simply looking for a newer vehicle was out of the question. Dad had paid for this car twice, after all, and he had made a vow: he WAS going to get his money's worth out of her. So whenever the CRV developed a problem, dad simply replaced whatever part had failed.

At first, this was perfectly ordinary maintenance. Cars get older. Parts wear out. Things need to be replaced. But as the years passed, the repairs became increasingly... comprehensive.

During this period, dad was again touring all over the country and was heavily focused on improving his promotional material, so I accompanied him to many of his shows to film them for the purposes of putting together promo tapes. I still have many of these tapes and am currently working on digitizing them. We also during this time began shooting his now-infamous DVDs. This was another very happy period for me, being on the road with dad was great fun and there are many road stories I look forward to sharing in the future. Dad's very bizarre Tom-Tom GPS, seemingly having a mind of its own along with outré knowledge of any given place, often took us on some circuitous and sometimes off-road routes - it seemed to desire for us to see many weird and remarkable sights. These I will also share at some future point.

In my opinion, dad stayed in marriage #3 WAY too long, but eventually he gave in and decided it was time to move back to Tennessee. I went up to Indiana with him and we again packed everything we could into the CRV for another Riggsian escape plan. On the way back to Tennessee, the CRV's battery gave out and the car wouldn't start. Instead of simply asking someone for a jump, dad's engineering brain kicked in: Since this is a manual transmission, you can put it into first gear, push the car which will spin the engine and one can start it. Ok, fine. One problem, the car was so loaded down, it would take both of us to push it. So we did with the idea that once we built some momentum, he could jump in and turn the key. There was only one issue - we hadn't counted on the downward slope we quickly encountered once we got the CRV moving. We had to chase her, jump in while she was gaining speed, get her started and get control of her. We were able to do all this in heroic fashion.

Once dad was firmly reestablished back in Tennessee, it seemed like EVERYTHING on the CRV began to wear out, break down, rust away, or otherwise surrender to the passage of time, and dad always simply replaced it. And little by little, piece by piece, the CRV of Theseus became exactly that.

Dad honored his vow to squeeze every last mile out of the CRV, driving it until just a few weeks before he passed. As I write this, it still sits quietly in his driveway. I don't yet have the heart to clear out his belongings or determine its final fate. Over the years, the CRV became almost a family member in its own right, a steadfast companion to our countless adventures. No, I do not have the fortitude to take on its ownership and ongoing care. Yet it feels equally wrong to let it sit and watch it slowly decay. In time, it will likely be sold off and scrapped. I am content with the idea that the CRV's time has passed along with dad, with whom it shared so many great adventures. May they both rest in peace.

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