The Yellow Beetle

Once you’ve sat, strapped in by an ageing seat belt in the days long before child safety seats, in the back seat of any vehicle powered by one of those classic air cooled engines, you never forget. Nor does anything else ever feel the same.

Dad bought our ‘Herbie’ home in December 1973. He was three years old (Herbie, not Dad) and sat proudly in the front garden, radiant in seventies yellow. I was five, Caroline was three. She puked in the back on only the second time we travelled further than Nans house. I laughed, Mum sighed and Dad had a face like someone had told him Bobby Moore was leaving West Ham for Fulham. I know this because later when Booby Moore left West Ham for Fulham his face was exactly the same.

I don’t remember Herbie ever going wrong. Dad went off to work in him every day. Mum still got the bus to the hospital because she couldn’t drive, we couldn’t afford two cars and the bus stop was at the end of our road. If Dad finished work early enough he’d pick me up from school. Tommy Wilson, who was in my class told everyone that Hitler had a car like my Dads so I hit him. I’m not proud but I was six years old. And my Dad didn’t even have a moustache or speak German. It’s the only time I’ve ever hit anyone in my life and over forty years later I still regret it. I’ve even tried to trace him via Facebook to apologise but do you know how many Thomas Wilsons there are?

I have clear memories of day trips during the school holidays. The run down the A127 to Southend, the sunshine pouring in making the black plastic seating so hot it burned the back of my shorted legs. The lack of aircon that meant both Mum & Dad had to have their windows wound down. This meant that once we got up to anything over 40mph Caroline and I had half our faces blown off sitting in the back. Mum passing half melted chocolate bars back to us, us getting covered in chocolate eating them, Dad getting annoyed with Mum because his unmarked black interior was now covered in Cadbury inspired fingerprint art.

Those weeks holidays on the South coast. Somehow Mum managing to squeeze all of our required gear into cases small enough to fit in the bit where most sensible car makers put their engines, ie the front bit.  That time when we were walking through the car park after a day on the beach at Littlehampton and got to Herbie just in time to see a man in a Granada estate reverse straight into him. Dad had that ‘Bobby Moore’ look again but luckily the man was distraught, apologetic and much smaller than Dad. He paid for the miniscule amount of repairs but I genuinely think it ruined the rest of Dad’s holiday.

Herbie always seemed to be there. When Grandad Denning passed away and Mum was so sad, she wanted to be on her own. It was the first time I ever saw her cry. Dad cuddled us, sitting on the sofa. Caroline was more interested in Tom & Jerry on the TV but I knew something wasn’t right. Mum came off the telephone, hugged Dad and we watched as she went and sat in Herbie. I thought this was strange because she couldn’t drive but Dad said she needed some time on her own.  Dad made a terrible dinner. It was some kind of chop with vegetables. Lucky for little Caroline she didn’t have grown ups dinners but I did. Even at seven years old I realised Dad was struggling but I knew it would be wrong to moan so I forced it down. Eventually Mum came back in. All her make-up had run down her face. With her long black hair she looked uncannily like Alice Cooper. A little while later we went to Grandad Dennings funeral. Perhaps turning up in a bright yellow Beetle might have seemed quite disrespectful in some circumstances but Mum who travelled in the big black car, just behind the hearse, insisted Dad drove Herbie there. It was like he was part of our family.

Time ticked on. I was getting taller, Caroline was become an expert in annoying me, Mum was now in charge of the nurses instead of just being a nurse, but Dads firm had started kicking people out. The atmosphere at home changed, Mum & Dad argued a lot. I was old enough to realise it was usually about money. Now it was my turn to spend hours sat in Herbie’s drivers seat just trying to get away from it. Here I would shut my eyes and dream of those stinking hot journeys to Southend, the popcorn, the candy floss, the ice cream, the melted Marathon bars, Mum laughing at Dad trying to look cool whilst chewing on a whelk.

Then almost overnight, things changed. Dad got a different job. For a couple of months he was away quite a lot. Now I realise these were training courses. New technology was coming into his job. In my ten year old’s eyes he became a giant again. He lost that slouching air of defeat. He had his self-respect back. Holiday brochures appeared on the living room coffee table. Mum said we’d be going to Spain in the Summer holidays. I found it on the map in the school library, it was somewhere called Nerja. At the time my main concern was regarding the quality of Spanish ice cream. Would it be as good as Southend Ice Cream or even as good as ‘Captain Ice’, who parked his van up outside our school as soon as the early spring sun hit the sky?

But ice cream concerns were soon to pale into insignificance. One Friday evening Dad came home from work as usual but for one thing. He’d had a lift into work that morning. It didn’t really register that this was unusual but when he arrived home he was driving. He was driving a sky blue coloured Vauxhall Cavalier. He parked it next to Herbie, thumped the hooter and me, Mum & Caroline came out of the house for a guided tour. Dad had his first ever company car. It smelt new (because it was), there were doors in the back, it had a working radio cassette and a sunroof. When on the following Tuesday Dad picked me up from school, I saw a couple of the other Dads nodding in quiet approval. Adam Warner’s Dad even said ‘jammy sod’ which confused me even more than Mrs Wiltons maths lessons.

Then events took a marked turn for the worse. The phone seemed to be ringing an awful lot more than usual and on the following Thursday a strange man with a very untidy beard and patches on his jeans was sitting in our living room when I came home from Scouts.  It was May 3^rd 1979, Mum went straight to the kitchen and put the radio on, then Dad calmly announced to me that this was Mr Long and he had agreed to buy Herbie and give him a new home. Almost forty years later its obvious we didn’t need two cars. That didn’t wash much with my ten year old self. I just went upstairs and cried myself to sleep.

Breakfast the next day was awful. Mum seemed so upset. She didn’t want Herbie to go but as I found out later she was more upset about Mrs Thatcher winning the General Election. Dad went off to work in that other car (I’d decided overnight that I’d refuse any lift in the Cavalier, a boycott if you like) . On Saturday 5^th May at precisely 11.34 am Mr Long drove off down our road in Herbie. I didn’t think that I’d ever feel worse in my entire life. West Ham could have won the First Division title that day and I wouldn’t have cared a jolt. Dad said Mr Long lived in South London so I’d accepted that I’d never see Herbie again. I told Dad he was the worst Dad in the world. I asked Mum if I could go and live with Nan.

Well its now 2017. Thanks to the love and support of the same parents I wanted to leave over a VW Beetle I’ve done alright for myself. So has Caroline. We both did OK at Uni, she’s away working in France as a teacher, I’m in Oil myself. Olive Oil. My company import it and distribute it around the UK. Mum & Dad have been married over 50 years. They still argue of course, its what keeps them going. Dad is 80 next week and me & Caroline were absolutely climbing walls trying to think of what to get him, then the penny well and truly dropped.

The internet is a marvellous thing. After three weeks of intense investigation I found him, or it.

Herbie. Registration FLC 376H. Now owned by a young man who lives close to and works at Prestwick Airport.  I wonder how on earth he got all the way up there. One email, one Ryan Air flight and a price twice its actual value later and I find myself driving this time, and not in the back, down the M6 and back to Essex in Herbie. He’s had his engine replaced since I last saw him. He’s only two years younger than me but he’s aged much better. His bodywork has been touched up. His welding is up to scratch and his got a working radio / Cd player. Still smells the same though. I think there’s an air of Caroline’s puke still in here. This journey is going to take ages. After all its over 400 miles but I don’t care. All I can think of is the look on my parent’s faces when I pull into their front garden and park up Herbie there for the first time in thirty eight years.  As a matter of note, Dad was on his way to a meeting in Southampton when a small lorry took the side off of the Cavalier. Luckily he wasn’t hurt.  He’d only had it for about nine months but it was written off. When I heard I laughed. Exactly the same laugh as when Caroline puked.