Raincharm’s Weblog

One little red bug in particular.

I have worked for my current employer for over 22 years. For most of those years I have driven the same route to work. We had to buy a car for me to drive when I started because it was not possible to take a bus. That has changed now, with only one transfer required. But to keep a flexible schedule I will probably keep driving until they put tolls on the bridges crossing Lake Washington. This could happen next year or the following year. This morning I was thinking how circular that would be … getting off the bus for the job, and finally back on to the bus.

As the number of customers we serve has more than tripled since I started working here, the amount of traffic heading off of the plateau in the morning has also significantly increased. When I started there were cars, but not so many that you couldn’t pick out a few that stood out as, “the regulars.”

One of my identified regulars in the beginning drove a red VW bug. Old style. The headlights had a kind of funny look, and the man driving the car had a goatee.  This car was a regular sight for years.

As time has moved forward, my time of commuting has changed here and there, to avoid traffic, both crossing the bridges and at the three high schools located along the last 1-1/4 miles of the trip. I am sure there have been similar impacts to the red Volkswagen. So, the sightings have been less frequent.

I have driven 3 different vehicles to work on a regular basis over the years. The brown 1981 Honda Civic (280,000 miles), the 2000 Mazda Protegé (still in service, almost at 100,000 miles), and the 2004 Toyota Prius (closing on 90,000 miles). And yet the man with the goatee still drives the little red VW bug. I spotted him this morning.

This entry was posted on January 28, 2010 at 9:08 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.