I recently purchased a vehicle (to be described later) that put me in mind of the vehicular stages of my life. It's something I think we all go through, with our transportation requirements shifting as our lives go along.

Unlike many of you, I never owned a car in high school. My parents thought that money that I would have used toward a vehicle was better saved for college. "My" car was my mom's Volvo, hardly the sort of sexy hotrod that most high school-age boys picture themselves driving. However, it did perform very well in the Suburban LeMans, a course I laid out with some friends whose vehicles were similarly lacking in acceleration but gifted with good handling.

That money I saved for college? Well, let's just say that it didn't go toward approved education-related expenses, which explains the extreme brevity of my first sojourn within the gates of higher learning. I didn't even have a car to sleep in when they took my dorm key away.

Entering adulthood, my first vehicular identity was Thumb Guy. Not owning a car (or much of anything else), I hit the road and hitchhiked around the country for almost a year. While it was a great learning experience, I really don't recommend it as a life choice. Most of my learning consisted of discovering things I never wanted to do again and jobs that I would give a kidney to avoid in the future.

Back off the road and settled in Houston, I became Motorcycle Guy. I had a 1986 Honda V65 Magna, with an 1100cc engine and just enough attitude to make me a little bit dangerous but not enough to warrant excessive constabulary attention. Houston was just about the perfect city in which to ride a bike, with weather conducive to comfortable riding roughly 11 months of the year.

This was also when I began the tradition of naming my vehicles. The Honda was Lochinvar, a mighty name for a mighty steed. I cruised the interstates, back roads and city streets, feeling all the while like this was the mode of transport I would use until my dying day.

Don't you love how Fate treats people who make decisions like that?

One marriage (and three stepchildren) later, it quickly became apparent that the motorcycle was no longer feasible. It was impossible to haul a family's worth of groceries in the saddlebags. Economic necessity forced me into several years best defined as Can't Afford A Decent Car Guy, beating to death a succession of Chevrolets and Pontiacs bought from the kind of used-car dealers who wear really loud suits and generally use either an animal or a large-breasted woman (or both) in their ads.

A happy accident during this period led me to my next stage: Art Truck Guy. I purchased a '75 GMC Sierra from my mechanic. He sold it to me, new engine and all, for a complete song due to the fact that it had been repainted with house paint mixed with various pigments by the students of Bellaire High School. There was writing in several languages and all manner of pictures, swirls and geometric curiosities from stem to stern.

All good things must end, and Rocky the Art Truck went to that Great Art Gallery in the Sky. In his place came Kahless, a '97 Dodge Ram 1500 that solidified my identity as Truck Guy. Once again, I thought I'd found the type of vehicle I would cheerfully operate for the rest of my life. Kahless is very much a base model, with a big bench seat, standard shift and not much in the way of creature comforts outside a pair of cup holders with a penchant for depositing oversized drinks on the knees of unwary occupants in the middle of curves. He's even got a vinyl floor, making it quite possible to clean the interior of the cab with a garden hose.

I actually still own Kahless, as owning a house and not having a pickup truck is simply unthinkable. From last year's state inspection to this one, my truck logged just over 1,000 miles, but every single one of those was important ... including the ones covered making a beer run when my friends stopped by and blocked in my other vehicle.

That "other vehicle," at least until last week, was the one that inaugurated my SUV Guy period. A gift from my folks in 2005 when they found out my older son was on the way, the vehicle in question was a 2002 Ford Eddie Bauer Explorer. This was "that" SUV, the one that makes some folks drool and others write angry, fuming letters to the editor protesting the fact that it was even allowed to be made. It had leather seats, power everything, tinted glass and a V-8 engine that would make its 5,500-pound carcass jump like a Ferrari (at the cost of a gallon of gas for a quarter-mile).

As a one-child family, we were fine with the Explorer, which I named Koloth. We could still fit two more people in the back, and with gas prices relatively low, the fact that it got single-digit mileage around town was no more than a minor annoyance. It was, for me, just about the ultimate vehicle. It had leg room to spare, the seats were so comfortable I could sleep in them (and did) and the sound system could make anything from Drowning Pool to Raffi sound awesome.

Then came Cooper, my younger son. With his car seat beside his brothers, only the most narrow-hipped of our friends could squeeze into the back seat. Cargo space was also an issue, with the two-child stroller taking up a hefty chunk of the Explorer's rear area, which had previously seemed cavernous.

So, last week, with a somewhat heavy heart, I entered the latest phase of my vehicular life. With a slightly shaky hand, I signed over the title of my beloved behemoth to the nice lady at CarMax and took possession of ... a minivan.

Yes, I am now Van Guy. No, wait, "Van Guy" sounds vaguely cool, like we're talking about a Ford Econoline with a built-in waterbed. I am Minivan Guy. I have acquired what is perhaps the most purely functional vehicle ever created for the consumer market. There is no wretched excess here. There is no V-8 engine to roar and eat smaller vehicles. There is no ear-blasting sound system. My new van, a 2006 Dodge Grand Caravan, has plenty to recommend it. There is seating for seven or eight, loads of cargo space, seats that disappear into the floor, and all manner of other highly functional goodies.

In fact, it was one of those goodies that gave the van its name. After the third time I keyed the remote to make both side doors and the rear hatch open and close, and taking into account the somewhat cylindrical profile of the newbie and its devotion to pure function, the name Davros popped to mind immediately.

Those of you who aren't "Dr. Who" fans can Google that.

I'm bonding with Davros, and I've already discovered I do enjoy the fact that Alex can climb in the van and into his booster seat by himself. The cargo space is also nifty, and I'm looking forward to getting a DVD player installed. In short, I've found a vehicle that's an extension of my home, where the family can be together even if a set of grandparents has come to visit. It was time to give up the dream machine in favor of the practical one.

For most 40-year-old guys, a change in vehicular identity means buying some midlife crisis machine like a Corvette, a Mustang or ... a motorcycle.

Wow. I did it backward.

I can still be Truck Guy once in a while, still roll down the windows and enjoy shifting gears while hauling loads or running solo errands. And I've ordered replacements for my favorite bumper stickers, whose text will be kept confidential lest they reveal my political affiliations.

Plus, the thought of Davros screeching "EXTERMINATE!" at slow drivers in the left lane is pretty cool.

Hey! I'm still looking for some great (or even not-so-great) UFO pictures. So far, my inbox has been largely full of the sound of crickets. Did the Men in Black get to all of you? Get to an untraceable computer and send me your shots!

Send all praise, castigations, professions of undying love or buckets of extra cash right here.