Blue VW Bug

by Trisha Leone

It’s one of my favorite pictures of you. You weren’t even two years old. Your brother wasn’t born yet. You were sitting in the driver’s seat of a blue Volkswagen Bug with your head barely rising above the window. You are smiling, and your tiny hands are gripping the steering wheel with your imagination in high gear, driving.

It’s hard to believe that I used to drive that car over Berthoud Pass in Colorado on snow-packed roads. I guess with the engine in the back it must have had some sort of traction. You would ride shotgun, buckled in your car seat, bundled up in a hat and mittens with a blanket tucked around your feet. Riding in that car was cold. If the heat worked at all, we couldn’t feel it. Of course, the exhaust fumes required that I drive with the window part-way down so we could breathe, which didn’t help the heat situation.

The VW Bug had a history, as all cars do. We bought it from some friends, a family I had known since I was in 5th grade. Their daughter, Brenda, was my best friend and the two of us had ridden in the backseat of that bug many times. I remember her older brother driving it. He was cool, and that made the car “cool.”  He played drums in the family band, a champion athlete who later achieved Olympic stardom, and had “surfer boy” good looks. At that time we were fairly new Colorado transplants. We had come from Southern California, with a car full of 8-track tapes, singing along with the Beach Boys “get around, get around, I get around.” 

The car was later driven by my friend’s older sister. She was attending cosmetology school in Denver. Brenda and I rode in the backseat on a warm spring day with the windows down, hanging out with the older girls and hoping to be just like them one day, pretty and popular.

Oh the stories that car could tell, I only know a few. I don’t remember what happened to it. Maybe it got restored and is still on the road today, but probably not. That VW Bug lives on in a photograph with a smiling boy behind the wheel, ready to take on the world and drive. 

Song lyrics

Blue VW Bug

I’ve got a picture of you from a long time ago                                                      

You weren’t even two years old                                                                        

You were smiling at me from the driver’s seat of a blue Volkswagen Bug 

With your mouth you made the sound of the motor                                              

Your feet didn’t reach the floor                                                                            

Your tiny hands held tight to the steering wheel of that old Volkswagen bug 

And you were driving, driving down the road                                                    

And you were smiling, taking a ride                                                                    

And you were flying, flying to another place                                                    

Singing a song in a blue VW Bug 

My friends and I would squeeze in the backseat                                                    

My older sister drove us around                                                                      

We’d giggle when she talked about being in love In that blue Volkswagen bug

That old car had some stories and I know a few                                                

But my favorite story of all is the one about you                                          

Traveling down a snow-packed road with the window rolled down                        

You sat next to me with a blanket tucked around your feet