The Eden Express_ A Memoir of Insanity - Mark Vonnegut [6]
The day I left Barnstable to go down to Philadelphia, I took my old boat, whose floating days were about over anyway, down to the end of Scudder Lane and left it on the beach just above the high-water mark, facing out into Barnstable Harbor.
CAR CAR. My trusty ’65 Beetle. Dead now. Sold for parts when I was in the nut house. It served me well. People said that it was only my faith that kept it running. It was the only car I’ve ever felt any affection for and I was the only one it would let drive it. Others would try from time to time, but it usually broke down within a mile or two and wouldn’t budge until I’d come and talk to it.
I didn’t always love Car Car. It was given to me brand-new by my parents at my prep school graduation. It floored me. I wasn’t the son of a struggling writer anymore, an image I had clung to long after it was appropriate. I looked at the car and decided that it would render me good dependable service but that it was utterly devoid of personality.
My conversion crept up on me slowly. It wasn’t until around 75,000 miles and three years later that we realized we were in love. Shortly after that its odometer broke, so how many miles of service Car Car actually gave is anyone’s guess. When you’re in love, numbers don’t matter.
It was at around 80,000 miles that I drastically altered the interior. I took out all the seats but the driver’s and made some plywood and foam rubber cushions to fit the void left by the seats. I upholstered them with some old curtains. This increased Car Car’s carrying capacity and versatility immeasurably. Ten people weren’t comfortable but it was possible. Two people could sleep in it. Two people and a dog was pushing it.
The primary reason I did it was carrying capacity. In its career Car Car carried a full-size refrigerator, a BSA 650, which I had to take apart some to get it all in, and lots of other stuff. If someone somewhere is keeping records of things carried in a VW bug, they should know about Car Car.
Waiting for Virge to graduate, in early June, I spent a couple of hours a day the week before heading west talking to Car Car and fitting it with an ice chest, drawers for silverware, a plastic sink, a water jug. I made use of every conceivable bit of space. It was Car Car’s job to take Virginia, Zeke, and me and all our worldlies to the promised land. Car Car was going to be our home for a while.
“Car Car, I know I’ve asked a lot of you and you’re tired. There’s just one last favor. Take me home. I don’t know where that is but together we can find it. Take me to Eden and when we get there you can spend the rest of your days turning to dust sheltering geese on their way to dust.” From studying designs for different farm buildings I had decided that Car Car was more a goose shelter than anything else. That was where its aptitude lay. It seemed to like the idea. I envisioned it as sort of a memorial in Eden. A reminder of times past when we used to need cars, and a symbol that all cars weren’t all bad. But as it turned out, Car Car took us to a farm that had no road access, so it never got to be a goose shelter. Maybe it was trying to say something. I renamed it “Moses.”
Two of Zeke’s playmates got killed by cars zipping around our block the week before we finally got going. I kept him inside or took him on walks in the fields. After a while it seemed as if the interminable farewells were part of a plot to get my dog killed.
Good-by, good-by, good-by for days, and then finally Virge and I were on our way to the promised land and whatever else came up.
One of the first things that came up was we got busted just outside of Pittsburgh. It was bound to happen sooner or later. My long hair and beard, my beat-up old VW, and the spirit of the times had all