We took ownership of a new car this week, a 2012 Golf TDI. It’s the first new car I’ve ever owned and the first car Aimee and I have bought together, but it’s not the first Volkswagen our family has owned. In fact, if I did the math right, it’s actually the tenth VW owned by our immediate family over the last thirty years.

In the beginning, there was a first generation Jetta, the little gold one with the abrasive upholstery. It was the first new car I remember us having as a kid.

Next came a 1985 second-generation Jetta, which picked up when we were in Germany. We toured the factory at Wolfsburg, drove the car around Europe, and sent it on its way. It’s the car I learned to drive on, and after we sold it, I saw it occasionally in its new home in Homer.

In the meantime, Dad had two second-generation Sciroccos in there somewhere, if I remember correctly.

Next came the 1995 GTI that my dad bought, and which I still drive today, a Mk 3 Golf. Here it is not long after we picked it up in Seattle, driving through the Grand Tetons on our way to Rochester.

Next was Scott’s Jetta III, which he bought in 1997 when the family was on the East Coast for my graduation. When he was helping me move to Greenwich that week, I promptly cracked the windshield trying to get a box that was too big into his front seat. Sorry. Since then, Scott and Sarah have acquired a fourth generation diesel Jetta which Sarah now drives, and Scott’s ride, a fifth-generation Jetta.

Aimee’s Passat was a fifth-generation version which she bought new in 2001, and which, after more than ten years of dutiful service on many road trips, we’ve just traded in towards our brand new Mark 6 Golf.

Tomorrow, we’re taking the car on its first longer drive, and we’ll see how she (he?) does.