This Ferrari sat for sale for months.
While I packed hundreds of Perfect Sear orders, I kept opening the listing.
Zoom in.
Close it.
Open it again.
I talked about it constantly with my friend Matt.
I even had the first song I would play in it picked out — “Vampires” by The Midnight.
I’d play it while taping boxes, imagining the drive, wondering what it would feel like to sit inside something I used to think belonged to someone else’s life.
Then Matt did something dangerous.
On his way into Arizona, he submitted an inquiry to the dealership with my information.
They sent me a walkaround video of the car sitting in the showroom.
The moment I saw it, I knew.
This just got real.
So I did what people do when their dream shows up too early.
I ignored it.
I wasn’t ready.
My first son was due any minute.
Buying a Ferrari felt irresponsible.
As my 30th birthday approached, I cracked.
I said, let’s at least go look at it.
The appointment was set.
And the day before my birthday, my son was born.
Showing cancelled.
Life has a way of rearranging priorities in the most beautiful way possible.
The first trip my wife and I took after he arrived?
We went to see the Ferrari.
They wanted $89,000.
In person, it was rougher than I expected. Terrible Mods, No maintenance history.
The fantasy cooled.
So I offered $70,000 — a number I thought would end the conversation.
They declined.
A few days later, they called back.
They were ready to play ball.
I went to pick it up.
As they pulled the car around, the salesman scraped it against a wall.
And said nothing.
I drove home floating — proud, terrified, grateful.
Then I saw the damage.
Eventually they owned up to it.
They took the car back to fix it and handed me the keys to a Ferrari 458 Italia while they made it right.
A surreal sentence.
We renegotiated.
The price came down.
The Ferrari became mine.
When it returned with fresh paint, something unexpected happened.
I turned the camera on it.
Up until then, my audience knew me for food.
Recipes. Fire. The torch.
This was the first car I truly shared.
And people loved it.
What should have been a nightmare became momentum.
“Dealer crashes customer’s Ferrari” traveled fast.
New viewers.
New conversations.
A new direction.
A blessing in disguise.
So I leaned in.
I caught up on deferred maintenance.
I modified it my way.
I made it louder than it had any right to be.
It was ignorant.
It was dramatic.
It was beautiful.
For the first time, I felt like I had my foot in the game.
Not visiting the dream.
Participating in it.
From there, the garage grew.
The Porsche 911 “GT3” (997) came next.
Then the Nissan 300ZX Twin Turbo.
But the Ferrari wasn’t finished teaching me.
Behind on maintenance, the transmission cooler failed.
Just like that, I was back in the deep end.
Most people would panic.
So we did what this journey has always required.
We learned.
A DIY transmission rebuild.
Harbor Freight tools.
Factory warnings.
No permission.
Another risk that looked like bad luck — until it turned into growth.
Another blessing in disguise. A reminder that things are happening for you and not to you.
Some cars are transportation.
Some cars are milestones.
And then there are the cars you promised yourself you’d touch one day, back when touching them felt impossible.
For me, that was the Ferrari 360.
The shape.
The sound.
To me this car was proof that the world I grew up watching from the outside might someday let me in.