Sticks got his learners’ permit this week in anticipation of needing to actually drive himself places instead of having one of us do it. Since he’s about 4 months away from being 18 we figured it was high time.
Tonight was the first opportunity he had to actually get behind the wheel and drive. Being filled with false bravado, I volunteered for the first driving lesson, figuring that by getting street and night driving out of the way in one fell swoop, Bigdog would be the one to tackle the art of freeway driving.
We started in a very large, empty parking lot. I figured it would be prudent for him to have as wide a berth as possible to make those initial mistakes we all make — forgetting to signal before turning, keeping the speed under the limit, and all that. Plus it’s an easy environment for confidence-building.
After about 20 minutes, I told him to turn right onto the street that runs behind the lot. This street leads to one of the main arteries here, where I planned to have him turn right and head out to some country roads where he could move the speed up past 35mph and really drive.
When he hit 40mph, my rational mind kicked in and all I could think of was..
“What the hell am I doing in the passenger seat? Have I lost my ever-lovin’ mind? ”
I swallowed hard and kept my mouth shut. I had told him that his goal should be for me to NOT want a smoke the minute he rolled to a stop. With one exception, he met that goal.
Coming toward another major street from a narrow one, we came across road construction. Sticks starts to signal right and for some weird, bizarre reason, he manages to turn the lights off at the same time he turns the signal on, and he starts drifting a little bit far to the right. As I calmly but loudly admonish him to veer just a titch back to the left, I hear the plit-plit-plit of orange pylons being run over, one at a time. He took out three straight on and sideswiped another four or so. When I stopped laughing long enough to look over, he was just a tad stressed, but honestly, it was pretty funny. Even he thought so after I told him to turn the lights on and keep going.
Overall, he gets a B+. We were out an hour and a half and only had run-down pylons to apologize for. As an added bonus, I made him stop at the railroad depot and fight off the drunk guy long enough to take a couple of long exposure night shots.
I’ve paid my dues, now it’s Bigdog’s turn. I’ll do night driving any time if I don’t have to be the freeway instructor. Stay tuned!
Technorati Tags: driving, learners permit, teenage driver
