This is going to show you how old I truly am. Back in my day, you had to take Drivers Ed before you could get your Learners Permit. As near as I can remember, driving at 15 seemed to be the one advantage that Idaho had over Utah. Most of my friends took Drivers Ed as part of their high school schedule.... but not me. I had too many other important things to do (whatever!) I think it was mostly because we had a Drivers Ed instructor who taught private lessons in our ward, so we decided to go that route. Anyway, effectively what that meant for a family of rule followers such as we were, was that I had little to no driving experience until right before I got my license.
The first time I remember sitting behind the steering wheel of a car was in the Hunter High parking lot when I was supposed to be in 8th period Debate. I can't for the life of me remember whose car it was, but I remember that Ryan Robinson and Rebecca Horrocks were in the car with me. It was a standard transmission and boy, was I over that whole thing in a hurry. During Drivers Ed, and in general at my house, I was lucky enough to learn on automatic transmissions. Little did I know that driving a stick shift would soon become a part of my driving experience.
About two weeks before I turned 16, my dad drove me out to a somewhat abandoned industrial park on a Sunday. I say somewhat abandoned because although there were few people working then, it was still open to some roving herds of sheep. What should that matter, you ask? How hard is it to miss a herd of sheep? Well, it's rough when you're still trying to learn the difference between the brake and the gas. Let's just say that there was more than one prayer uttered for Mary's Little Lambs on that Sabbath Day. (Warning: objects in blog post are closer than they appear!)
May 26, 1990... the big day. I had my Learners Permit, but not my license yet. That would have to wait until after school. But the morning of my birthday, my parents took a leap of faith and my mom probably took a Valium and we all loaded up in the car to drive to breakfast at Hardee's (I know! We know how to celebrate.) My mom loved their cinnamon raisin biscuits and it seemed close enough to home that it would be a fairly benign outing. What follows below is the true story of "why the chicken crossed the road?" Or better yet, "what happened when the chicken crossed the road?"
It was about 6:30 am and after procuring our breakfast, we were on our way back home. Said chicken had unfortunately attempted to cross three lanes of rush hour traffic on 3500 South and was dead to begin with. I swear I had nothing to do with that. The problem was, he was just squished on the road. Now that some time has passed, I recognize and appreciate the advice my dad gave when he instructed me not to run over the chicken; and yet, things were moving pretty fast at that point and being among that many other moving cars was new to me. I froze up and bore down on that poor piece of poultry. I don't know why I find this story so amusing, but I do.
The final story of myself as a new driver has to do with learning to drive a stick shift; I mean truly learning. After turning 16 and pitching what has become one of the most regrettable fits of my life, I was the proud new operator of a 1979 VW Rabbit.... but it had a standard transmission. One night, my dad decided that we would go driving on the big roads and learn how to drive in traffic; which really meant learning how to recover from stalling in traffic. At the intersection of 3500 South and 4000 West, it happened. We stopped at the light and the car died when I tried to go again. Honking and flipping of the bird was happening all around me and I was really stressed. My dad handled it calmly and in stride; my mom and I? Not so much. Now, honestly, why we took my mom with us again is a mystery. She has systematically hated yielding her position as driver and only did so when I was 32 and the space requirements for car seats dictated that we take my minivan instead of her car. Anyway, after several stalls that night and for some time after, I finally mastered a stick shift and the world was my oyster.
I love driving. I love the feeling of being in control that it gives me and the feeling that I have that I can go and do whatever I want. I still largely follow the rules my parents gave me when I started driving; I wear my seatbelt, I keep a mostly full tank of gas, I don't let anyone else drive my car and I obey the speed limit. I do, however, enjoy listening to the radio. That was my parent's insistence, but is now the only thing that sometimes keeps me from driving my kids into the ditch.
No comments:
Post a Comment