Bug

When I turned 16 and since I was the oldest sibling, I got to go shopping with my dad for a car for me (unbeknowest to me, it was to shuttle my brother and sister around thus saving my parents the burden of taxi driver). Since we didn't have a lot of money, we ended up at the car lots that most of us try to avoid where a tall moderately dressed salesman showed my dad and I the options on the lot. When my dad finally saw the car that was soon to be mine, the gravitational pull far exceeded any logical purchasing methodology and immediately we were sitting inside.

It was a 1973 VW Superbeetle: Kelly green. It had a bad torsion bar in the back so the rear end sat a little too low, the turn signal didn't work so some previous owner had attached some aftermarket switch to the steering column and it had a wheel for a gas pedal (yes, a wheel). My father had owned a 1968 VW Beetle when he and my mother were married so the car had a bit of nostalgia attached to it. Granted, that car was new when they owned it and this one had several thousand more miles of use along with it's 16 years of age.

After the salesman came back with the temp plates, we fired up the engine to hear that distinct motor sound that only an old VW can make. A cross between a lawnmower and an old coffee can with rocks in it. I was in the driver's seat since this was to be my vehicle. I had never driven anything foreign before so I had to orient myself with how the stick shift worked. The year prior was spent with my grandfather, brother and I crammed into the front bench seat of a 1983 underpowered Ford Ranger on the back roads of McCall, ID learning how to run a stick shift. I had done well to learn (and not kill the three of us in the process) and had practiced with my dad post summer driving school, but there I was staring at the "H" pattern on the German auto.

I couldn't find the reverse. The pattern graphic had 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 in the typical design with the "R" up and left of the #1. After several futile attempts of trying to shove it into gear, my dad realized what I was doing and calmly showed me that you have to push down on the knob to engage the reverse. Oh (I thought the Germans were good at engineering)...

I pulled the car forward slowly out into the side road and up the first stop sign a couple hundred feet away and stepped on the brakes.

Nothing happened.

At all.

I coasted through the intersection as I searched frantically for the emergency brake that was tucked and hidden underneath the cheap faux fir seat covers between the two front bucket seats. I found it and got us to stop.

I looked at my dad like he was crazy for even considering this car. It was totally uncool for any self respecting teenage boy. I had friends whose father's rebuilt classic cars (notably my friend Jeff's red 1967 Mustang) or who were lucky enough to get a new one. This car was lame and ugly - bad combination. I should be getting something at least with some potential cool like a truck or something - not the vehicular equivalent to a date with the marching band.

I limped the brakeless bug back to the dealership and fully expected to say a polite "thank you for your time" and go far away. My dad had other ideas. Then he dropped this bomb on a 16 year old outside the sales office:

"You can either get this now or wait another year"

What kind of ultimatum is that?!? To dangle the freedom of my own vehicular transportation - to go wherever I deemed necessary to go when I wanted to in front of me with the sudden damnation of broken VW bug or it's almost diabolical equivalent of exile from said desired freedom. With a scowl I took the car. I couldn't imagine being the only high school senior without a ride.

My dad paid for the car and we got the laundry list of issues fixed - or at least mask them so they weren't so apparent. My dad did concede to outfitting the car with new wheels and tires and a cheap tape deck for tunes. The new wheels were too wide and since the rear suspension wasn't fixed, the rear fenders would rub against the tires when I had more than two people in the car leaving a nice groove in the tread along with the rancid smell of burnt rubber lingering in the car.

I hated the car.

I hated the smug little face of the front end of the car with its cheery headlights and curvaceous fenders. I hated its chrome bumper that seemed to just smile at you reminding you of your own tampered image. I hated the goofy turn signal and the wheel for a gas pedal...

Then, after a few months, it grew on me and I actually found myself not feeling contempt but some minor affection. It was my car. The long warm ups that never really warmed up the car really weren't all that bad - even when we covered the windshield with a big pink blanket to help combat the frost. The curvaceous body actually had personality and even its smiling face was kind of interesting to look at.

But the deal that finally sold me was another dramatic reveal of the car's flaws. One early spring day I was headed out of town to visit a buddy of mine who lived out in the farm country west of town. I had zipped through town and pulled onto the freeway on ramp to drive the 10 or so miles to his house.

I was gaining speed, which if you've ever driven a VW bug at freeway speeds then you're a liar because the car can't do freeway speeds. A slow gallop is closer to the pace and I'm pretty sure that 0-60 could be clocked with a calendar and top speeds claimed by the manufacturer were only obtained with a strong tailwind. Anyway, I was flooring the wheel-for-a-gas-pedal to the floorboard and was fiddling with the crappy stereo to find a radio station of choice. I had taken my eye off the road and was concentrating on getting the analog radio dial in the right place when

BLAM

I looked up and all I could see was a Kelly green wall of the bug's front hood and a freshly cracked front windshield. I sat up immediately and fiddled for a second or two trying to think of what to do next. I couldn't see anything.

I was on the freeway travelling as fast as the engine would give me with the curved front hood now acting like a giant scoop. Amazingly, I calmly kept going straight and rolled down the window and looked out around it - just as we were taught in driver's training and slowed the car down to the side of the road.

Looking around the left front fender I could see the pink blanket that I used to cover the windshield that previous winter half hanging out which made the moving car with it's hood up in the air like a giant mouth with it's fuzzy pink tongue hanging out in the wind.

I glanced over to the oncoming traffic across the median to see drivers staring at the spectacle of the gaping mouth in their own disbelief as I worked to stop the car. I'm sure they weren't expecting to see that on their journey.

I secured the hood with some rope and continued my journey. Although the car had failed me (again) mechanically - this time with the potential of killing me in some tragic fashion - I actually found it endearing. Kind of like your best friend who just can't seem to catch a break but ends up being the butt of jokes from all of the ineptitude from his misadventures.

We sold the bug when I went to college that following fall. For a few years afterwards I would see the car sitting at a new lot in town trying to be sold to some other unsuspecting owner then finally one summer it was gone. Every time I see an old bug on the road that is the same shade of Kelly green I wonder if it could be my old car.

I don't think that anyone ever forgets their first car - how they felt to have it and the open doors of freedom it brought at that critical juncture in their adolescent lives. But for me, it was an experience to grow to enjoy something that I initially wanted nothing to do with only to have to live out that relationship through necessity.

And who knows when that next Kelly green bug will show up in my life?