At our usual Sunday night family dinner, our fifteen year old niece was talking about driving. When I admitted that I did not get my license till I was 21, there was an audible gasp around the table.
It may be unusual not to get your license until you are that old, but I had my reasons. Two of them. And they were called my parents.
My dad's idea of driving was like watching somebody play Beat the Clock.
"Did everybody go to the bathroom?" he's ask as we started off on a 2000 mile car ride. "Cause we're not stopping till we get there. I figure I can make it in eight hours or less."
Then he's buckle up, synchronize his watch to the local bank clock, get into the passing lane, press the gas pedal all the way to the floor, and keep it there. He knew every detour, side road and alternate route just in case he hit traffic, construction or anyone doing under 90mph.
"We're five minutes ahead of schedule," he'd gloat as we passed a predetermined landmark (that usually had a bathroom we all looked at longingly).
And if he could shave fifteen minutes or more off the entire trip? It was like his birthday, Christmas and the fourth of July all happened on the very same day.
My mother's driving style can best be illustrated by an incident that occurred my freshman year of high school.
Back in those days, it was safe for the male upperclassmen to "hitch" a ride to school in the mornings. One of them made the mistake of getting in our car...once. As my mom bobbed, weaved, coasted through stop signs and generally drove like a contestant in last place on The Great Race, he turned pale, began to shake, and seemed to be either praying or composing his own eulogy.
"You can't believe the crazy woman I got a ride with this morning," I heard him say to his friends after he stumbled out of the car and kissed the sidewalk.
We thought we saw him hitching again a few day later, but it was hard to tell from the angle we had. After all, pretty much everyone's backside looks the same as they are diving into the bushes to hide.
Finally though, it was my turn to drive, so I signed up for driver's ed. The poor teacher never had a chance, or should I say teachers. For some reason, after usually only one lesson each, they suddenly developed some mysterious malady that made them unable to sit in a car. Well, my car.
The first poor soul decided after fifteen minutes or so of driving around the parking lot, that I was ready to hit the open road. As I raced down the street ala mom, he cautioned, "A bit slower."
Slower? I was only doing sixty. My grandmother could walk faster than that. Any slower and a snail would pass us.
At the end of the block, I approached a yellow light and instinctively did what either of my parents would do...I gunned it.
"Brake! Brake! Brake!" the instructor screamed as his fingers dug holes into the dashboard and his life flashed before his eyes.
Confused, I slammed both feet on the brake and skidded to a halt with a flourish a Hollywood stunt driver would be proud of. I turned to the teacher. What was his problem? Had he only ridden in a horse and buggy before?
After he scraped himself off the front windshield and realigned his nose, he suggested that perhaps we should save challenges like lights for the next lesson and stick to parking lots for the rest of the day.
Lesson two was a different teacher (Geez, you'd think they could find people who were not afraid of their own shadow to teach driver's ed.), who decided that I was ready for highway driving. Hehehe.
You'd think he's never been on the Dodge Em's ride at the amusement park or seen an Indy 500 race the way he carried on. I mean, isn't that why there are two lanes, so you can weave in and out and beat everyone to the exit? Clearly they needed to screen the instructors better to find people who didn't get dizzy from the scenery flashing by at 80mph. Back to the parking lot.
And so it went, until I finished the course. One instructor actually made it through three whole lessons (I believe they awarded him the Bronze Star).
Before I could get my actual license though, my dad decreed that I needed to learn to drive a stick shift since I would be driving my mom's car and not his. (The rule in our house has always been that nobody, but nobody drives my dad's car. The man could be in a coma with both legs in traction, but if he heard someone even touch his keys, he would hop up and bolt for the door shouting, "I'll move my car out of the driveway! You take your mom's car.")
And now we come to the real reason it took me so long to get my license. My dad was not born to be a teacher. I didn't realize I signed up for boot camp when I got behind the wheel for the first time. It was bad enough I had to work the clutch, gas and shift at the same time, but he was continually upping the ante.
"No, no," he'd correct, loudly, as he made me stop halfway up the hill in front of our house. "You're doing it all wrong. How are you ever going to be able to stop on a ninety degree mountain path in a blinding snowstorm with 200mph winds, pulling a tractor trailer and start up again without rolling back 1/4 of an inch if you can't do this?"
Uh. I'm thinking that if I ever find myself in that situation, I am going to have bigger problems than rolling back down the hill a foot or two. How about at that point, I just admit defeat and call you?
"I'm a car," he'd say, standing on the line of a parking space, "park next to me and see how close you can come without hitting me. Oh, and back in without using any of the mirrors. You should know where your car is."
Really? Are you sure you want to do this? Cause I'm pretty sure I can get away with an accidental homicide charge. Maybe some community service or counselling.
But my favorite teaching tactic of his was when he (finally) let me out on the street.
"Turn when I say turn. As soon as I say turn," he'd tell me.
Easy. Right? Not so much. As I'd be passing an intersection, he's suddenly yell, "Turn! Now!" as though someone had thrown a live grenade into our foxhole.
Usually panic-stricken, I'd jerk the wheel, press the gas, brake, clutch, cover my eyes,ears and mouth, pull out the rosary, worry beads and holy water...and end up on someones front lawn shaking like a leaf.
"Let's try that again," he'd pronounce, unruffled. Patton could have taken lessons from this man on drilling the troops.
But I had had enough. In defeat (which was probably his plan all along), I handed over the keys and resigned myself to committing the bus schedule to memory.
It wasn't until Tim came along, and in the ignorant, confident, flush of youth decided to teach me to drive. It has to be a testament to true love that he married me anyway. Then again, his driving, if not his teaching style is very similar to my parents'.
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