The Love Bug

I wouldn’t say I have the most sophisticated sense of humor, but there are many things that I find comical:

1. Candid photographs with laughable expressions.
2. Practical jokes or pranks.
3. Movies.
4. Situational events, which may take years to appear funny:

The western sky was a beautiful rose color as Pop buffed out the last few places on his new car. It was the “golden hour,” that time of day that’s best for photography; the light is softer, shadows more muted. Most of the VW brochures laying around the house featured cars that were photographed during the golden hour.

Pop had been a Detroit guy his whole life…a succession of Chevys, Chryslers, Buicks. But the quality began to suffer in the 1970s, and when our Plymouth station wagon decided to simply dump all its oil as he was driving, he decided maybe it was time to try his luck with the famous German engineering.

His VW super beetle was his pride and joy. Equipped with an eight-track player, cloth seats and a four-speed stick shift, he fussed over it like a picky mother. But alas, the Beetle was destined for a troubled life.

I borrowed it for my first date with my future wife. My car was a junker that didn’t even have air conditioning and I wanted to make a good first impression. I took her to an expensive seafood place and, trying to impress her, ordered the lobster. I didn’t even know how to eat it, and managed to get only a few bites here and there before the waiter brought the check and a to-go box.

The box went into the front trunk and I forgot about it. A week went by with the VW parked at Pop’s workplace in the broiling hot Florida sun. A pronounced fishy smell began to permeate the garage and finally the next Saturday, Pop circled around, sniffing. He opened the bonnet. The to-go box was covered with ants and the putrefying smell sent us fleeing with streaming eyes and dry heaves. The car smelled like low tide for weeks.

I was banned from borrowing it again…but that didn’t keep my brother Doug from backing his station wagon into it a few months later as he was headed to work. Ooof.

On another occasion, Mom asked Doug and I to run into town and pick up some stuff at the grocery store. Doug reminded her that Pop had taken her car somewhere, so we’d need to take the VW. She blanched, handed us her list, and implored us to be careful.

No problems, except coming home…a jug of Clorox somehow tipped over on the rear passenger floor. The lid was loose and by the time we got home, it was all over the rubber floor mat and underneath to the carpet. Dang. We did damage control, blotting up as much as we could with water, paper towels and rubber gloves before replacing the rubber mat over the carpeting. Looking back, it was a pitiful effort.

Several months went by. Pop was driving home from work with Glenn Miller playing, and suddenly there was a loud road noise and gusts of hot wind. He looked all around, then glanced at the rear floor and saw the road whizzing by through a hole the size of a saucer. There were no cellphones in those days, no early warnings, no shouted expletives that would have sent us running for cover. We were completely caught off guard, lounging on the couch watching TV when he burst in from the garage, breathing fire in our faces.

It took a week of his favorite dinners, plenty of un-prompted chores and several sessions of floating around the pool in his K-Mart lounge chair with a bourbon and coke to fully get us out of the doghouse.

The end came several months later as he was leaving work. He saw smoke coming from the rear engine compartment and got out to investigate. He opened the hatch and leapt back as flames shot out.

He managed to grab some tools and other stuff from the front bonnet and sat down in the shade of a palm tree. He could hear the distant wail of sirens, but it was too late. The fire spread rapidly from the rear engine compartment to the passenger area. He watched his beloved VW go up in flames.

This time, no bourbon and cokes, no Kmart pool lounger. No body shops or airing it out. Just the VW hood ornament over his workbench and a new appreciation for the famous Japanese engineering 🙂