Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice came out in 1988. I was five years old. If you’re unfamiliar with the movie, its about a couple who die in an accident and return to their house, only to learn a new family has moved into it. They work with a mischievous spirit in an attempt to scare the living out of their home. It’s one of my favorite childhood movies because the humor is so dark. I mean, how many times do you get to make light of something as serious as death and the afterlife? And the dinner party scene? Are you kidding me?!

In the movie, the Maitlands, who are the deceased couple, live a simple life in a simple town. While driving home one day they have an accident and drive off of a bridge. For me, this wasn’t the interesting part. What got my attention was the car they were driving: a mustard yellow Volvo station wagon. Why? Because my mother had the exact same car. It wasn’t a common car; not something you saw many people in our area driving around in. It was unique and big, and built like a tank. I remember watching the movie and gasping at the fact Adam and Barbara Maitland were about to die in what looked like my mother’s car.

I wish I could say my mother still has that car, but unfortunately she does not. It was an ’81 240 DL, and over the years it developed a ton of mechanical problems. At one point, one of her mechanic friends had to install a starter button in it. I have tons of memories of riding in that old car. When my Mom carpooled my friends and I to school during my middle school years, that was the car we rode in. When my parents drove up to New York to visit family, that’s the car we made the eight hour trip in. My friends and I used to ride in the hatch, using a rubber cord as a seatbelt (it was the 90s, what do you want, safety?). Trips to the grocery store, and the library…all because of that car. When my mother last owned it, there were over one million miles on that car. It was used when my father purchased it, and once it crossed one hundred thousand miles the good people at Volvo sent my mother a medallion to display on the dash board.

I still see other old Volvos on the road every now and then. Occasionally, I see a mustard yellow one, and I wonder…

Happy Thursday everyone. And RIP Catherine O’Hara, who played Delia Deetz in Beetlejuice.