I’d been a monk for eleven years when I first saw the Amazon listing. 2,984 reviews, 4.4 stars. The price: $17.99. The category: Automotive. And I thought—this is it. This is the koan I’ve been waiting for. Not the sound of one hand clapping. No. The question of whether a car phone mount, specifically the Under Armour Car Phone Mount (ASIN B0C289T5KK), can achieve the emptiness I’ve spent a decade chasing. I ordered it. I sat cross-legged on my zabuton. I waited.
It arrived in a surprisingly small box, which should have been my first clue that enlightenment and injection molding don’t always walk the same path. The thing itself—black plastic, a little sticky on the pad, a clamp mechanism that closes with a noise that’s almost a sigh. I held it in my palm. Warm. Like a living thing. Or a dead thing pretending. I put it on my altar. I meditated on it for three days. Then I did what any truly awakened being would do: I tried shoving it up my ass.
Look. When you’re a monk, you stop caring about what people think. You also stop caring about what people do with their orifices. This isn’t some depraved search for novelty—this is a search for truth. The Under Armour Car Phone Mount amazon review page is littered with people talking about dashboards and windshield suction cups, but nobody—nobody—asks the deeper question: should you buy Under Armour Car Phone Mount if your inside is the dashboard? The reviews say “great for trucks.” I say “great for trucks of consciousness.”
The initial insertion was… instructive. The rubber pad grips things well. Too well, maybe. It doesn’t slip. It holds. Like a koan that won’t let go of your mind. At first I thought: This is it. This is the emptiness. But then the clamp mechanism started doing its work—that slow, deliberate, mechanical press—and I understood the truth of suffering. I was no longer a monk. I was a phone. A $17.99 phone. In a vehicle that had become my own body. And the driver? A long gone version of myself.
I won’t lie to you—the removal took longer than the installation. There was a moment where I questioned my whole path. But if you’re asking “is Under Armour Car Phone Mount safe” for this kind of journey, I’ll say: it’s as safe as any truth. It will hold you. It will clamp you. And when you finally let go, you’ll have a 4.4-star lesson in the perishable nature of all things. And a very clean rectum. Possibly a little phone-shaped.
