My second car, in 1976, was an orange, 1970 VW Beetle...the bug. It had a tiny, undersized steering wheel (illegal at the time-oops!), a lovely large trunk in front, a radio that could pick up public radio in upstate New York, but no local stations, a heater that worked only in the summer, and never, ever in the winter, a windshield defroster that only cleared a 4 inch space on the lower left side (which required me to scrape ice off the windshield by sticking my mittened hand out the window, holding an ice scraper, while driving 70 mph on the highway), no working seatbelts, an engine that often only started when you hit he orange distributer cap with a wrench, or pushed the car downhill while popping the clutch, and handling that couldn't be beat!! I once drove off the road during a snowstorm, ending up backwards on a rotary. I just had to shift into reverse, drive back over the snow bank, and onto the road. It was never really, completely, stuck.
It had a tendancy to decrease speed when heading uphill....which meant starting up Temple Mountain at 50 mph, and arriving at the top going barely 20 mph, with a long line of frustrated drivers behind me. It could tear around the flat streets of Boston, however, dodging in and out of 4 lane traffic, with ease. The horn worked, which aided in this procedure. When blizzards hit, and no other car could travel the roads, you could pack the car with stranded motorists and push effortlessly through the snow, getting to work before everyone else...something that I rarely could do in good weather. It had a fiesty windshield wiper motor that liked to catch on fire, causing me to pull over when the smoke became too thick, to scoop up roadside sand to toss onto the flames. Replacement motors would do the same thing.
After all of this, you would think that I would not look fondly on it's memory. On the contrary, I still dream that I open my garage door and see it parked there, always saying "Whew! I'm so glad that I kept that car!"
A close friend had a VW bus, which carted us up to the White Mountains each winter to ski. It didn't always make it back home without a tow truck. On one such trip, the sun had set, the temperature had dropped below zero and the bus quit, drifting silently to the side of the highway. We tied a white t-shirt to the radio antennae, and, as this was the 1970's, prior to cell phones, sat in the dark praying that someone would stop to help us. I can still remember how cold my feet were, because I only had my old, hard ski boots on, with wet, wool socks. I took off my ski mittens and wore them on my feet until help came. I looked like a frozen, demented lobster. Good times.
Now I hear that the last VW bus will roll off South American assembly lines at the end of this year.
Another icon from my youth will be gone, but my memories will remain, a happy blast from the past whenever I see a picture of, hear a story about or hear the clucking sound of a vw bug or bus.....
ah, what sweet automotive blisss.
