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When a Piece of Your Childhood is Discontinued
The Volkswagen Beetle will soon be a remnant of the past.
For me, it already is.
By the end of this year, the Volkswagen Beetle will be a remnant of the past.
For me, it already is.
Yeah, I know, it’s just a car. But it’s a car that defines a big part of my childhood.
Some of my earliest memories are of my mom driving my brother and me around in her Volkswagen Beetle, which (if my memory is correct) also happened to be her very first car. It was white and resembled Herbie the Love Bug of Disney fame, which — perhaps not coincidentally — was one of my brother’s favorite movies.
One night, our Volkswagen was stolen from right in front of our Northeast Philadelphia home. This was around 1975. Or maybe 1974. I was only about five or six years old, yet I remember standing on the walkway of our house in a state of shock that a stranger could steal something of yours. (I was a bit of a sheltered child.) The theft made a significant impression on me. Our Volkswagen was never recovered.
We bought another Volkswagen, a bright yellow Beetle that we picked up on a frigid winter’s night. That may have been a foreshadowing of things to come because I recall the heat always being a bit problematic in that car. Either that or…
