I Was DONE With L.A.
Published December 16, 2025 · 9:17 · 114,576 views
About This Video
Van Neistat started 2025 having written off Los Angeles. The fires hit, and the city's leadership, in his words, let it burn. He couldn't leave during the fires to attend Dr. Rich's funeral. Dr. Rich was the man who told him on a ski lift when Van was 15 that "a parent should teach his children to master their environment, not to fear it." That sentence is the spine of the video, even though it arrives late and without emphasis.
The opening is a repair. Sasha, who lost nearly everything in the fires, brings Van a great-grandmother's sewing stool. The bolt is broken. Van reaches for a screw extractor bit, and the bit snaps off inside the hole, which is worse than the original problem. The backup: cut a groove with a Dremel, then use a screwdriver to torque the broken piece free. He cuts new threads for a replacement bolt. The burned wooden top gets replaced with shelves from his previous studio, finished with linseed oil. Sasha's response when she sees it: "I love it so much more than its original state." That line is the turn in the video and, as Van tells it, the inflection point for his entire year.
What changed was not the city. What changed was Van's relationship to the damage. The sewing stool repair is a small proof that a thing pulled from ash can come back better than it was. The A Fix segment runs on this premise, that the repair is never only about the object. See Fixing the Zip-Line Without Permission and An Unauthorized Repair for the same instinct applied to public infrastructure.
By the end of the video, Van has replaced running with trail crew. He climbs mountains and maintains the trail to a firewatch lookout, which serves the same cognitive function his old running routes did but with the added output of a maintained trail. A Land Cruiser repair trip to Park City is on the calendar. The closing line is "December is going to rule and so is 26," the most forward-looking thing Van has said on camera in months. Sponsor: Zocdoc.
The video has pulled 114,576 views since December 2025, and the tools-and-craft framing is accurate but incomplete. This is also about what it costs to stay in a place that tried to burn you out. Related: Escaping the LA Fires for the direct crisis footage, Details Within Details for more on how repair reveals character, and The Reality of Owning a Vintage Truck for the Land Cruiser thread that runs through Van's Los Angeles life.
FAQ
What did Van Neistat repair in the LA fires video?
A great-grandmother's sewing stool belonging to Sasha, who lost most of her possessions in the 2025 Los Angeles fires. The bolt was broken, a screw extractor bit snapped off inside the hole, and Van used a Dremel groove and screwdriver to extract it. He replaced the burned wooden top with linseed-oiled shelves from his old studio.
Who was Dr. Rich in Van Neistat's video?
A man who told Van on a ski lift when he was 15 that "a parent should teach his children to master their environment, not to fear it." Van could not attend Dr. Rich's funeral during the fires because he was unable to leave Los Angeles. The line becomes the video's thesis.
Is Van Neistat still living in Los Angeles?
Yes. The title "I Was DONE With L.A." uses past tense because the story is about what changed his mind. The repair of Sasha's sewing stool and her response to the finished piece marked the turning point. He now does trail crew maintenance and has plans for 2026.
Transcript
The bit broke. LA. And you know what? While I'm at it, [music] running, too. This neighborhood is called Glassell Park. And I actually used to live up over there.
All right. So, this is the only [music] thing that survived.
Yeah. I pulled this out of the um out of the ruins. [music] Everything was ash. I went looking for this, so I was
relieved. I mean, it's ash, but it's also like, [music] you know, piles of ash and debris. It's not just clean ash. So, it was like in
the rubble, you know. I knew where it was. It was like right by our fireplace, so I knew where to look for it. And what was it originally?
So, it [music] was my great grandmother's um sewing stool. [music] And it had like wood across the side.
Yeah. Yeah. Wood. It was a black piece of just like wood. Okay, now this is slipping in my hand.
Might just put vice grips on it because I'm going to replace it. Shoot.
It broke. Damn it. When 2025 started, I had written off LA because the
leadership let it burn. And while it was burning, I couldn't leave to go to Dr.
rightous funeral and give my eulogy. May not have been my doctor, but he was a very positive influence in my life. Damn
it. That's was my fear. This is going to be a much more difficult repair than I had expected. All right. Well, I'm just going to go for broke with this one. I think this one's broken, too. Oh, no.
It's coming out. This is what was supposed to happen with the other one. I might be able to back this out.
A screw extractor bit is threaded backwards. So when I tighten [music] the extractor bit, it loosens my bolt.
First you got to I'm going to drill a hole into the bolt
that snapped off in there. First I drill into the stuck bolt so the extractor has a place to dig into. Then I twist lefty
loosey which tightens the extractor bit and loosens the bolt.
Theoretically the bit broke. Unless of course you break the bit off in there. Hardened [music] steel and I can't drill it out. Oh boy.
and running because Dr. Rich was a lifelong runner and died of a heart attack at 79
and I had an injury. Just diagnosing this injury took months and two emergency room visits. Booked an appointment with my doctor. Waited
something like a month for the appointment. Rode all the way to Santa Monica for the appointment. Remember, our roads are closed because of the fire
damage. So, I have to go all the way around the valley to the 405 to I get to the office. The receptionist says, "Oh,
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Book [music] an in-person visit. I got to see somebody about this mystery cough I have and book a physical. No-brainer.
Going to use Zachdoc. Go to zdock.com/van to book an appointment with a provider who will listen, understand, and support you. And the link is in the description.
Thank you. Zach dock. [music] So, the bit snapped off into here. I'm
going to dremel it and try to back it out with a screwdriver.
So, we dremel a groove into the broken extractor bit and back it out with a
screwdriver. Oh, yeah. I got the bit out. Okay, I'm just going ham now.
This doohickey cuts threads into the new hole so I can screw in a fresh bolt.
And the black and steel just blends in perfectly. Sasha told me the original top was black, but if I paint it black, it's going to look like a shiny black brand new thing. And I want to put something
special into this. And these are the shelves from my previous studio. So, these have like good energy in them.
This is what this wood looks like fresh after you linseed oil it and after it's been exposed to the sun and really dries out, it turns this beautiful orange. And
I think it just blends in. It looks like they're married. It looks like they've always been this way.
Hi. All right. Don't feel like you have to react like a TV person just cuz I have the camera. I just knocked your dog's water over. Sorry.
Oh my god. I love this. It's I actually love it so much more than its original state.
And that is when my year turned around after Sasha said, I love this. It's I actually love it so much more than its original state.
That was the inflection point for 2025. [music] I started to look at LA through a lens of gratitude. Sasha and her wife and their two kids lost nearly everything.
Just about every item in their new house had been donated, including their clothes.
My family lost nothing in the fires. Thank God. And I would have ended my eulogy for Dr. Rich with a bit of wisdom he taught me on a ski lift about 35 years ago when I was 15.
He said a parent should teach his children to master their environment, not to fear it.
So now for exercise we do trail crew climbing mountains and maintaining the trail to a firewatch lookout. [music] We're in love with LA again.
Like I said, like everything like this and everything is donated and this is like like a piece of our familiar home, you
know? It's like the first Yeah. familiar piece. Okay, go.
December is going to rule and so is 26. If you have something special and broken in your life, join my Patreon and send me a DM and maybe I'll come to you and
fix it. End of December, beginning of January, I'll be in the Park City, Salt Lake City area. So, if you live around there, I'll have the Land Cruiser with me. Join the Patreon. Send me a DM. Link's right there. And I hope I get to meet you.
Products & Tools Mentioned
- Zocdoc mentions — sponsor ('Zachdoc'/'Zakdoc'/'zdock'/'zdoc' in transcript - auto-caption misspell
- Dremel uses — used to groove broken extractor bit
- vice grips uses — used during repair
- screw extractor bit uses — tool for removing broken bolts
- linseed oil uses — wood finish
- Toyota Land Cruiser essential — mentioned for upcoming repair trip
People Referenced
Sasha, Dr. Rich