THE SLOW ROAD TO HIPPIE HEAVEN

In 2007 we traveled to Colorado to buy an old VW Bus we saw on The Samba.com. The trip was quite an adventure. Since then, we’ve been fixing her up when we can find extra money and craftsmen willing to work on her at the same time. Presently, she is mechanically sound, sporting white walls and a renovated body with a fresh paint job, new windshield glass, LED headlamps, and those adorable white bumpers that were standard back in 1966. We found an auto upholstery guy in Dayton who recovered her front seats in leather back in 2019 and will be making rear cushions to match as soon as we get the bed installed. When we moved here, we got lucky and found Dave, a guy who works exclusively on old Volkswagens. You might think, with so few old Bugs and Busses still out there, that Dave is a starving artist, sitting around like the Maytag repairman, waiting for the phone to ring. You couldn’t be more wrong. Vintage VW’s in various states of disrepair are parked all over his property, eagerly awaiting their turn in the garage. Last week when Dave texted and said he was ready to do the interior, we wasted nary a minute getting her there. She’s got seatbelts now, the floor is in, and her interior panels are being crafted as we speak. Next, he will install the furniture I built last year (from a kit custom-made in the UK that cost us, like, a bazillion dollars), reframe and seal the pop-out side windows, fabricate new windows for the snow top (Google it), and install a new roof vent. I’m hoping she’ll be show-ready soon, and come October, we’ll be riding across Lake Erie on the ferry for Kombis on Kelleys (Island), sponsored by our local VW league, appropriately named LEAKOIL.

The poem below, an ESPINELA, is part of Muri’s 2022 Poetry Month Challenge.

SHOWTIME!

The renovation has begun
at last, on our Volkswagen Bus
With luck, she’ll be returned to us
in time to have some summer fun

Windows sealed, door panels done,
Z-bed and cabinets in place,
we’ll journey in our groovy space
to campgrounds hosting Kombi shows
and gawk all day at rows and rows
of Splitties, Vanagons, and Bays