The sun is beating through the glass of the station wagon, the vinyl seats are sticking to the back of your legs, and your little brother is humming just a bit too loudly. Suddenly, out of the corner of your eye, you spot it: a flash of rounded yellow metal peeking out from behind a grocery truck.

“SLUG BUG YELLOW! NO PUNCH-BACKS!”

Before he can even blink, you’ve landed a solid (but loving) thump on his shoulder. You’ve won. For the next ten miles, you are the undisputed champion of the highway.

If you grew up in the sixties or seventies, this wasn’t just a game; it was a rite of passage. But why did we all decide to start hitting each other because of a specific German car? To understand the game, you have to understand the “Bug” itself... a vehicle with a history as curvy and unexpected as its fenders.

The People’s Car: A Complicated Birth

The Beetle’s origin is a paradox. It was born in 1930s Germany under a dark cloud, commissioned as a Volkswagen... literally, the “People’s Car.” Adolf Hitler tapped Ferdinand Porsche to design a vehicle that could carry two adults and three children at 100 km/h while remaining affordable for the average worker.

• The design principles, led by Porsche and Béla Barényi, were revolutionary for the time:

• Air-Cooled Engine: Positioned in the rear, it didn’t need a radiator, meaning it wouldn’t freeze in the winter or boil over in the summer heat.

• The “Boxer” Engine: Its flat-four design gave the car a low center of gravity and that distinctive, rhythmic “thrum” we all remember.

• Aerodynamics: The beetle-like curve wasn’t for style; it was designed to reduce wind resistance. A concept virtually unheard of for an economy car in 1938.

From War Machine to Peace Symbol

After WWII, the factory lay in ruins and was nearly scrapped. However, British Major Ivan Hirst saw the car’s potential. By the late 1950s, the “ugly duckling” arrived on American shores.

Against the backdrop of the 1960s, the Beetle underwent a radical transformation. It became the “anti-Detroit” car. While American manufacturers were adding chrome and tailfins, the Beetle stayed small, honest, and quirky. It was embraced by the counterculture, turning from a relic of war into a global symbol of peace, love, and “The Love Bug,” Herbie.

The Great Debate: Slug Bug vs. Punch Buggy

As the Beetle’s popularity exploded, so did the game. But depending on where you grew up, you likely called it something different. It is a regional divide as fierce as “soda” versus “pop.”

• Slug Bug: This is the preferred term for those raised in the Midwest and the West Coast. Proponents argue it’s the superior name because of the satisfying rhyme.

• Punch Buggy: This version dominates the East Coast and the South. It typically requires a more formal declaration: “Punch buggy [color], no punch-backs!” The “No Punch-Backs” clause was the essential legal framework of the schoolyard. Without it, a simple road trip could devolve into an all-out physical brawl before you even reached the state line.

The Golden Era of the 1970s

By 1972, the Beetle did the impossible: it surpassed the Ford Model T to become the most-produced car in history. On February 17, 1972, the 15,007,034th Bug rolled off the line.

Because they were mechanically simple and incredibly durable, they were everywhere. They were the first car for teenagers, the second car for suburban moms, and the “forever car” for professors. Their sheer prevalence is what made the game viable. You couldn’t drive five minutes without seeing one. It was the original “I Spy,” but with a contact-sport twist that kept kids alert for hours.

Why We Still Look for the Bug

Production of the original “Type 1” finally ended in 2003 in Mexico, with over 21 million units made. While the modern “New Beetle” tried to capture the magic, nothing quite matched the smell of hot vinyl and the vibrating floorboards of the original.

Today, seeing a vintage Beetle on the road feels like spotting an old friend. We don’t punch shoulders as often as we used to, but that instinct to point and shout... to notice something small and unique in a world of grey SUVs, remains. The Beetle wasn’t just a car; it was a shared piece of our childhood landscape. I learned to drive stick in my girlfriend’s beetle in high-school. And let’s be honest: if you saw a red one right now, you’d still want to be the first one to call it.

My family kept secrets. Or we simply didnt communicate well. Not like its a conspiracy or something. Everyone just wants to be happy, and move on from the bad shit, you can’t blame them.

But the secrecy and the unwillingness to confront an uncomfortable truth can breed evil, like mold growing in the damp dark. If these things were dragged out into the light of day the light would kill the mold.

When I limped home after my Dad died, seeking comfort in what used to be, I met a monster.

My family kept secrets. The town kept secrets. In this freedom, in this darkness, my step-dad blossomed. He was able to keep secret what he was doing for a long time. He was able to sort of control himself. But then things got away from him. He lost control. I think at some point he just thought he deserved everything he lusted for and he was angry he had to take it. So he worked out his anger by forcing what he wanted. Demanding it.

People lived in fear of what my stepdad might do. In secret, his soul festered and rotted, and he let his evil roam free. Noone would confront him or even talk about what the knew or what they suspected. This left him free to do what he wanted. When nothing pushed back, he blossomed.

Not many knew it at the time, but it would come to light that he was raping women and intimidating them into silence. He raped, he beat, he intimidated. Six women, my Mom and eventually he would viciously attack my Sister. Before that happened nobody in the family said anything. Nobody in town said anything. Everyone was afraid. Afraid if they said anything , he would come for them.

When he wasn’t getting the respect he felt he deserved from my Mom, he locked her in the basement and shutoff the electricity. When she demanded he let her out, he put a gun in her face and told her to go back down. Eventually, when what he was doing started to come to light, she’d say it was just his drinking. And it was only when he drank liquor. She’d stress how he never acted that way when he was just drinking beer. It’s scary how people can justify things and get used to things.

There were signs, but you think they’re harmless quirks at the time. He was intolerant and prejudiced. Before he wore my Mom down, she was strong. She would push back. He was bossy and would pout when he didnt get his way. He hated mashed potatoes and he hated turkey for Thanksgiving. My Mom cooked our traditional turkey and mashed potatoes every year, cooking a separate ham for the asshole. We joked about his dislike of turkey. He laughed, we laughed. He stewed. Brewing his discontent and hatred of our disrespect. Secretly plotting to have his day.

Eventually, he turned his full attention to his discontent... his anger and his feeling like he deserved what he wanted. One Thanksgiving, when it was just him, my Mom and my sister, he pulled the turkey out of the oven and threw it in the trash. Said he couldn’t stand the smell.

When they confronted him, he weakly stewed in his beer, steaming, but saying nothing. He was afraid of them together like that, strong and questioning him. Just you wait he fantasized. They didn’t have to wait long.

He was afraid to fly. My Mom loved Hawaii. For Christmas we would get Mom a trip to Hawaii for a vacation. His gifts from us focused on his interests at home. He liked to play while my Mom was off enjoying her vacation. While Mom was on a Hawaii trip with her friends one year, the asshole would stay home with a drunken plan. Come to find out, he had a hobby. Raping women and intimidating them into silence. Looking back, I wonder if he was actually afraid to fly or if it was just a convenient excuse to be left alone to his own devices, to his own sick plans.

Only this plan got away from him. His evil got off the leash. My sister ended up in a hospital after he tried raping her. He punched her in the face trying to subdue her. But instead of knocking her to the ground where he could have at her, his brutal punch knocked her down the stairs. She picked herself up and ran out the front door into the snow. Bloody, barefoot, and in pajamas, she ran down the road to the neighbors.

The asshole went to jail for a year. But my family kept secrets. People knew something bigger was going on. But it wasn’t spoken about. The story that people focused on and accepted was that the asshole was in jail for “drinking and driving”. It’s amazing how people will ignore the facts in front of them and lean into a false narrative.

You’d think my Mom would have left him finally. For her, his brutality was out in the open. But his evil had beaten her down, extinguished the spark she used to have. She descended into her bottle, her cigarettes, her TV. She shutoff the world around her, except the work that paid the mortgage. And she chose this life over her daughter. She lived in denial it had happened and terror that it was coming for her.

I didn’t understand at the time. But it was a pattern. She was full of dread and anxiety and just a feeling of exhaustion. Couldn’t think. Just sat in a chair all day feeling numb, listening to the quiet, watching TV.

The asshole lost his excavating company while in jail. He lost everything except my Mom and the house. The secrets continued. He got out of jail a year later. A year later, when I limped home, in shock over my Dad’s death. Collision course.

Spoiler alert. It doesn’t end well. Not at all. And this is all one sided, about me. About how I felt. Eventually I’d like to tell my sister’s side of it. It was so much worse for her. Losing a parent when they die is aweful. Losing a parent before they die is heartbreaking.

Like I said, my Mom didn’t leave the asshole. They stayed together after he got out of jail, and she lived in denial of what he had done to my sister. He embraced her denial and didn’t show any remorse, any regret for what he had done. In fact he leaned into his resentment and his anger, and he blamed my sister for him losing his business... for her destroying his life. She became the outcast, she became the one who couldn’t attend family dinners. Not because nobody wanted her there, but because she didn’t want to be there. She couldn’t be around him.

The denial from everyone that surrounded him gave him courage. He blossomed... he focused... he planned.

In a rage over losing his business, he plotted against my Mom, against our family. He hatched a plan to force my Mom to sell the house so that he could move her to a remote location and control her more fully.

It was their habit that he did the household paperwork, tracking the utility bills, mailing the checks that paid the bills and mailing the check that paid the mortgage. One day, he received a letter from their mortgage company informing him of a new address to which he was to send the mortgage payment. The mortgage company had a new parent company with a new corporate address to send payments to. With this letter, they returned his check, requesting that he begin sending payments to the new corporate name and the new corporate address.

What he did instead, is unbelievable. He simply filed that returned check into his filing cabinet and sent off another check. Same as before to the same old name and same old address. The next month he did the same thing. And then again and again and again. Each time he said nothing to my Mom and simply filed the returned checks into a file folder. And with this file folder were more documents. Documents indicating he was searching for real estate to buy. He was looking for new land and a new house.

In the end, after the dust settled, I would find all of these documents, and all of these checks , and all of these letters from their mortgage company. I would piece together his motivations, his intentions and his evil plan. But at the time, as it unfolded, none of us had any idea.

He continued with his plan until they were default on their mortgage. In his mind , he thought that he could show my Mom that they had to sell the place. That they had to find some place new. He believed by stockpiling the returned checks. He could eventually use that as his hidden money to finance his plans and to buy the new house. He balanced the books at home for my Mom to see and she never checked. Never had any reason to. So she had no idea the money was still in their account.

So he caused them to go default on their mortgage, and he kept it up through the grace period, keeping the whole thing secret. Until one day, the sheriff posted a note on their door... a notice of eviction. The house was being repossessed by the bank, was going to be sold at a sheriff’s sale. And they had to leave the property. They had gotten other notices , and he had filed all of these away.

So they we’re forced to move, to put everything into storage. As I helped them move things into storage, he would call the police on me, claiming I was stealing their belongings, trying to have me arrested. My my mom would intervene telling the police that I was helping them move with their permission. Small towns... everyone knows each other. The police officer’s response when this happened was “Oh, that’s what I thought, just Norm being an asshole”.

So then the asshole sort of got his wish. Not a new home, but a new place. They found a place to rent out in the country where he could have more control over his favorite possession, my Mom. His evil grew.

One day, while I was visiting my Mom out there, he picked a fight with me. When he thought he saw his opportunity, he viciously attacked me from behind, kicking me beating me with a chair and demanding I leave his house. I took the chair from him and tossed it aside, we grappled and fought. I beat him unconscious.

When he woke up on the ground, he looked up at me and said, “I’m gonna fucking kill you”. And he began crawling towards his 357 magnum pistol that he kept loaded in his desk. I kicked him in the face as hard as I could, blood and snot flying. When he woke up again, he looked at me and said the same thing. “Im gonna fucking kill you”. So I kicked him in the face again as hard as I could. More snot, more blood. My mom just standing there watching us.

Unbelievably, when he woke up again, he just wouldn’t stop. Again he looked at me and said “I’m gonna fucking kill you, motherfucker”. And so I unleashed on him, punting him in the face like I was going for a sixty yard field goal. He laid there unconscious, bloody, and drooling. And then when he woke up, I looked at him and said “Say it again, motherfucker, just say it one more fucking time, just say it again, motherfucker”. I waited, but he wouldn’t say it again. I walked outside, took out my cellphone, and called the police. I figured I was going to jail.

When the police arrived, I told them what happened, but they didn’t believe me. They handcuffed me, put me in the police car, and then went inside to get a statement from the asshole.

Being the belligerent prick that he was, he believed he had the right to toss me from his house. Demand that I leave and if I refused, he believed he had the right to beat the shit out of me. It had been his plan all along. And so he admitted everything to the police. He admitted coming up behind me, attacking me, demanding that I leave his house immediately. He told them how he threatened me with his gun and how we fought while he tried to get to it. He admitted that he would have shot me if only he’d been able to get to his gun. He wanted me arrested for trespassing and assault. But he didn’t know Michigan law.

My Mom had invited me over. She’d asked me to come set up their satellite dish so she could watch TV. That’s what I was doing when I was attacked in the living room. The police informed the asshole that he couldn’t do what he thought he could do. That it was illegal. Since I was an invited guest in their house , he had no right to forcibly remove me. The police informed him that he had assaulted me. He became belligerent with the police, demanding they leave. They felt there was no danger to my Mom, and so they left.

The police came outside, got me out of the car, took me out of the handcuffs... and shook my hand. They said they couldn’t believe what a prick he was, and that I had done a good job standing up for myself. Then they told me about michigan law. They said this was a simple assault case and they couldn’t arrest him on the spot. They had to wait for a bench warrant from the judge. They said, if I had something stored inside the house or If I kept any of my belongings there, it would have been domestic violence, a different kind of assault, and they could have arrested him on the spot. They asked me if I wanted to press charges. I said you bet.

My Mom came outside, asked if I was okay. She said, “wow, you really beat the shit out of him. Maybe I should leave him”. I said “yes you should Mom”... but she wasn’t ready to walk away right then, right there. I gave her my cell phone... told her to keep it, and hide it, in case she needed it.

The the asshole had to go to the hospital because I had fractured his face. But he wasn’t about to learn his lesson. I had merely fueled his rage. The shit storm that was about to happen was unbelievable.

My mom would not survive his rage. For what he did to my sister, he was a registered sex offender. Every month he had to check in with authorities. On one of these check-ins, the bench warrant for assaulting me was served on him, and he was arrested and put in jail. It had taken about a month for this to happen and my Mom was surprised that I had pressed charges and followed through. She was angry with me for having him arrested. She felt it was a family matter that had gotten blown out of proportion.

What transpired after that was really tragic, and I can only touch on the facts without going into great detail...its just too painful.

The asshole isolated my mom, refusing to let her leave the house. She wouldn’t talk to me for 2 years. Over that time, the asshole starved her down to seventy five pounds. She was broken and dying when he took her to the hospital finally. But with food and care, they were able to save her. Because she was in the hospital, in a public place, I was able to go see her. We rallied around her and blocked the asshole from continuing his abuse.

And then she began complaining of a stiff neck. A visit to urgent care, “doc in a box” I call them, resulted in a prescription ibuprofen. When she returned a few weeks later, still filling unwell, they just refilled their prescription, told her to go home. A week later she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. The doctor said the tumor in her neck had wound around and through her spine, and had snapped her neck. He said the only thing keeping her alive now was the tumor itself. She died 3 weeks later.

But not before the asshole was done with her. She was moved to a hospice facility. The asshole claimed that it was too far for him to drive and that he wanted her to die at home. And so he tried to remove her from hospice, tried to pick her up and carry her to his van. Nurses stopped him and secured my Mom. But he tried a couple more times. Because of this and they file that they kept on him, I was able to obtain a restraining order. And I was able to go to court and be assigned legal guardianship over her. But it was too late, and my Mom passed away a half hour after I got out of court.

There’s no summary here. No wrap up. Just pain and tears. Oh, except for the asshole. You might be wondering what happened to him.

I had been planning to kill him. He just wouldn’t stop. He just wouldn’t leave my Mom alone. He wouldn’t stop terrorizing her. He wouldn’t stop visiting her in hospice, telling her he was going to take her home. She would cry, asking me not to leave cause she was afraid he was going to come take her. He kept threatening to take her, kept doing what he could to torture her while she was in hospice. She was his favorite possession and he didn’t want to let her go.

He just wouldn’t leave her alone. And so I prepared to do what I had to do. You always have hope. Even with her diagnosis, we hoped she would live somehow. Denial is a powerful thing. So when she did die, I prayed to God. I explained in my prayers, how I had been ready to do what was necessary and right. But now that my Mom was gone, there was no need to try to protect her anymore. No one could hurt her anymore. And so I told God he had fucked up. He had let loose a monster on the earth and it was his job that he failed to do... to control such a beast. In my prayers, I told God it was his job. It was back in his hands, I was done.

A couple months later, the asshole was found dead sitting in his chair watching tv. He had died from a massive heart attack. The asshole was gone.

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Here’s a Picture I just took of the sunlight rising over my pond! What a beautiful morning today!

How do you get started in the morning? I was feeling anxious about the blank page awaiting me this morning. Not because I have a block... because I have so much I want to share and I didn’t know where to begin… Ever feel that way?

The anxiety of my “avoidance reaction” is the little dread of that high-energy, “painful” dissonance that comes from a big, unsolved puzzle… like all the ideas you have for that blank page. It’s crazy that I can feel this way on such a beautiful day, with so much promise ahead.

So I do something physical, something to get me moving… something to burn off this excess energy and help me enter a flow state that's pleasurable. I decided to go outside (there’s a frost this morning and it’s only October!) and take a couple pictures for you. And I want to share a technique I use on mornings like this...

How you can start

​One way to start your morning is to begin with low-stakes, solvable dissonance.

​Don’t open your main project first. Instead, start with a “warm-up” exercise that is designed to be solved quickly. This lets you experience the “pleasure” of resonance (the “Aha!” moment) almost immediately, which breaks the anxiety loop and builds momentum.

My warmup are these pictures for you. The sun is rising, it’s going to be a great day!

Here’s how you can use the same idea for your routine. It's a 5 min routine. I use a 5 minute hourglass. I put a rubberband on it to subdivide the time and just to play with the hourglass... they’re cool.

​My 5-Minute Morning Routine

1. ​Create a Tiny Puzzle: Open a separate document or notebook (not your main project). Get a single, random input. This could be from a random word generator, or by opening a dictionary and pointing to a word.

2. ​Solve It (5 Mins): Set a timer for just 5 minutes (hourglass timers are fun). Your only task is to write one paragraph that uses that word in a meaningful way.

3. ​Feel the “Click”: This task is small and non-threatening. When you complete it, you’ve successfully moved from the “noise” of a small problem (”How do I use the word ‘compass’?”) to the “clean signal” of a solution (a finished paragraph).

Cognitive Resonance

​This 5-minute warm-up gives your brain its first “pleasurable” hit of cognitive resonance. You’ve started your day with a win, not a fight. This positive, low-energy state makes it infinitely easier to then turn to your main project and tackle its more complex “noise.”

Does this technique work for you? What do you like to do to warm up your day?

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I took a 23 n Me dna test and discovered a new aunt or sister. When I reached out, she didn't want to talk to me.

The DNA Test

Your results are ready.

Oh shit. Wow...Oh Shit.

At one point I said to myself, "I guess Mom could've had an affair?..."

Such a possibility had never occurred to me before. That wasn't my Mom. My Mom didn't screw around. I had no idea growing up that my dad wasn't my dad. No idea my mom had an affair.

The First Big Match

The first big match was a new aunt or sister it seemed, the estimated dna % was virtually the same, and I had no more context. I didnt recognize her or the family name. My Mom and Dad have both passed away. Most aunts and uncles too. My sister Terri hadn't wanted a test, so I couldn't compare her dna percentages. I hadn't talked to my brother Greg in years.

Wait, What?

I had taken the test to find out how much neanderthal dna I had inherited from ancient ancestors. I was fascinated by this topic and that was my focus, originally. So I wasn't really ready for the information. Sure, I'd checked the boxes and marked off the waiver... "acknowledge... you might be suprised by...", but that wasn't why I took the test. When I read the results I was like, "wait, what?".

I Reach Out

Confused but excited to find out more and connect with new family, I reached out to this new match on the 23 n Me app. Who was she? Why were we related? I figured a reply could take a while, so I continued browsing dna matches.

The next strong match was a new cousin. Her family and my family had always been friends. Real good friends, I'd come to find out. I'd always called them "aunt & uncle". And I'd find out she and my Mom had worked together.

I Was So Confused

At this point I was thinking maybe my uncle had slept with someone or had been married before to someone else. This isn't so improbable given the stories surrounding my uncles. My uncle's ex-wife had an affair with, and ended up marrying, a man who's last name matched my new cousin. In a Jerry Springer moment, I remembered my uncle's ex-wife was my Mom's best friend.

I Reached out Again

I reached out to my new cousin and asked if she wanted to compare notes and figure out how we're related.

She replied right away.

Amara was great. (names are changed to protect privacy). We connected right away. She shared her family stories and I shared mine. Amara worked with my Mom, but we couldn't recall meeting. We live in different parts of the country, so we became friends on facebook, and Amara introduced me to other family members. It was so cool meeting Amara. We're from the same small town, so it felt like we already knew each other.

But my first dna match, the aunt or sister, never replied.

I didn't hound her. Sent only the one dm on 23 n Me. I wanted to respect her privacy and not stalk her, but it seemed odd to me that someone with a 23 n Me profile didnt want to dm on a close match. Huh. That's weird, I thought.

I'd come to find out she didnt want to meet me. She knew who I was, small towns, and sent me a message through the family grapevine. She said she had no interest in meeting me or forming a relationship. But she thought I should know it was common knowledge that her Dad had an affair with my Mom. Family consensus was that she was ashamed of her Dad and his affairs.

That made sense. But, as I'd come to find out, there might be more to it.