Have one remember that he promised his 15 year old daughter that he would take her Saturday to allow her to practice her driving skills.
She's supposed to go drive for her driver's ed class on Monday and Tuesday, and basically has had no time except for a few minutes with Mom in a parking lot a month ago.
Oh, man, where to start?! Well, I suppose on the Internet. I've been looking around at several sites, and some are no more than a recitation of the rules from various state driver's manuals, while others make the process of operating a motor vehicle only slightly less cumbersome than a Shuttle launch. She pretty much has a book knowledge of the stuff she needs to know, which is fine if all she ever did was drive a book, but she needs actual wheel time. The other thing is that she already knows everything. Just ask her.
I remember my driver's ed classes. I really like them a lot, even though we had a crappy hunchbacked '78 Olds Cutlass four door to learn in. But I really wanted to learn and do a good job, and I'm not quite sure Oldest really has that much initiative.
Anyway, I have my own ideas about what's important, and I suppose we'll just have to see how it goes.
First, I firmly believe you ought to know how a car works, and where all the fluids go, and what they all are for, and where the fuses are, and what can go wrong mechanically, and how to change a tire. Especially for girls. Don't think you can rely on someone else to bail you out, because the time might come when you have to do it yourself. So, I think we'll start with a little walkaround in the driveway and familiarize ourselves with the machinery.
Second, the proper attitude. Kids are kids, meaning they have a basic level of insanity that takes years to wear off, meaning that it's hard to get them to understand exactly how dangerous a hurtling pile of sheetmetal can be. I'm somewhat worried that she will choose to emulate her mother behind the wheel, who is quite adept at astonishingly poor attention to the task at hand, and cannot stop talking, and talking with her hands. Paying attention is going to be a hard battle to win--I can already hear the fuss about keeping the radio turned down to inaudibility.
Third, which kinda goes with the second, is what to do if you get pulled over. It is an extraordinarily bad idea to give cops lip, or make sudden diving moves toward the floorboard. Flashers on, pull over quickly as soon as you find a wide spot, turn the ignition off (leave it on accessory if you have electric windows), turn the interior light on if it's dark outside, keep your hands on the wheel, and obey all instruction promptly and without a snotty teen attitude. Say "sir" or "ma'am" to everything, and mean it. Yes, yes--I realize in a perfect world of democratic comity, such obeisance would not be necessary and no one would ever get pulled over for no reason by unthinking law enforcement agents. Whatever--argue that to the judge. Sure better to do that than try to repair bullet holes in soft tissue.
The rest is what really gives me the willies. Trying to tell someone else to go faster or turn right or left or stop or trying to describe to someone else how to judge position or distance is almost like trying to drive by looking at your skidmarks in the rearview mirror. It's hard to anticipate what sort of harebrained thought someone else might have--you KNOW what sort you have--but those of others are unfathomable. I figure it'll be good to start out in a wide parking lot with no cars--probably the high school, and let her get comfortable with the way the car feels when it goes and stops and turns, and how to make it go faster and slower, and AAAGGGHHHHH! Oh, nothing--don't mind me. Wasn't yelling at all. Nopester. Just a bee or someTHINNNNNNG!
I have dim memories of my dad teaching my sister to drive, which might be causing part of this anxiety. Both of them were hard-headed as mules, and my sister came of age at a time when it was quite fashionable to question parental authority, man, and it was never a very pleasant time, because my dad was of the generation that won WWII. Lots of fireworks, let me tell you.
My mother did most of my non-school teaching, and she bugged me often about a variety of things, but I do think she impressed upon me the need to anticipate trouble before it comes up, and be ready to react to it.
I suppose we'll see how that works.
Posted by Terry Oglesby at June 16, 2005 04:15 PMI lasted one day with my mom trying to teach me. She jerked the wheel out of my hand and nearly wrecked us, I refused to do any more driving with her. My dad taught me mostly, we only aruged a few times and the passenger side floorboard of my 84 Mustang didn't fall out (although I'm positive there are grooves from his imaginary brake pedal).
Before I got to take the Mustang onto the road, I had to: change the oil, check the transmission fluid, check the coolant, find the gas tank, find the switch to open the gas tank door, and master the wonderful art of changing a tire with puny girl muscles. I don't know what the law is in your state, but when I practiced, teenagers had their permit for 6 months (now I think it's a year), couldn't drive at dawn (ha!) or dusk.
Having a basic knowledge of how it all works is a good thing-because I'm guessing she won't be driving a brand new vehicle, something is likely to go wrong and it always happens when no one is around.
You'll both be fine. Is she learning on a stick or automatic??
Thanks for the reassurance, Leah! My mother was good with the imaginary brake pedal, too. She still is. Good to hear you know how to fix stuff, too. I think that it's never a bad idea to be self-sufficient. As for the car, mostly she'll be driving our '01 Focus (automatic), which, so far, has been trouble free. Meaning the law of averages is probably going to catch up with us as the wrong time, but whatever.
I do wish we still had a stick shift in the stable for her to learn on. I think everyone needs to know how to use one of those, too.
Posted by: Terry Oglesby at June 16, 2005 09:52 PMI should have empathy for you but...we have twin! boys! learning how to drive. One's impulsive and the other knows it all.
Posted by: Earth Girl at June 17, 2005 07:29 AMI set out to teach my Daughter to drive. We went to a mostly deserted sub-division (they existed in Colorado Springs in 1994) to practice the basics. At the first right turn, she veered over into the left lane. I told her she needed to stay in her own lane where upon she told me that she didn't like to be restricted by rules. End of driving lesson. Like her brother, she went to a private driving academy (no drivers' ed in Colorado) and was turned into a fairly safe driver.
Posted by: Larry Anderson at June 17, 2005 08:04 AMIf I had the money, I'd send them all to someplace like Bondurant. As it is, the Possumblog School of Advanced Vehicular Dynamics is the only thing available that is in keeping with my budget.
Impulsive?! KNOW IT ALL!? Why, I just can't believe a teenager would act like that! I know I never did anything impulsive, and I always deferred to adults.
::sigh::
Posted by: Terry Oglesby at June 17, 2005 08:31 AMI also was one of those nearly perfect teens.
Posted by: Larry Anderson at June 17, 2005 09:04 AMParking lots are good, but deceptive like a driving range. With all that wide open space everything feels like a straight drive. Then graduate to a relatively empty country road somewhere.
My mom taught me (and still lectures almost 15 years later. Moms. Gosh. I don't need to be hemmed in by rules, ya know?) but I read somewhere that its best if it doesn't come from the parental authority. An older uncle or something. Less stressful. Makes sense.
Also, when the Big Day comes, call around. Back in my day, for example, they didn't make you parallel park at the Bessemer DL office.
Posted by: Kenny at June 17, 2005 09:09 AMAnd still doing a good job as an adult, Larry. ::snicker::
Kenny, that's one of the good things about her high school--there's both wide open areas and several smaller curvy areas, plus some obstacles and junk, and it's also right on a small country road that doesn't get a lot of traffic.
And you're right about the parental thing--she takes orders just fine from the library ladies where she's volunteering this summer, but I swear if I told her to breathe, she'd stop just for spite.
But she's gonna have to parallel park, whether she likes it or not.
Posted by: Terry Oglesby at June 17, 2005 09:15 AMY'know, I was terrified of getting into a wreck when I was starting out. I didn't even watch all the gory crash scene movies 'cuz I was freaked out enough as it was. It was after I went to college and was driving a lot more that I got cocky. Maybe you have a couple of cautious years to get used to the idea of Oldest behind the wheel.
Posted by: Lenise at June 17, 2005 09:37 AMI am somewhat grateful that she has not been one of those kids who pester their parents for years about driving. (Like I was.) She's rather noncommittal about the whole thing, I think mostly because it requires effort and spending time being told what to do. But, whatever.
Posted by: Terry Oglesby at June 17, 2005 10:04 AMI didn't get my license until the summer after I graduated from college, when I was 20. I rarely got a lesson from my parents. Mostly from college friends, whose parents probably would have killed them if they had known they were giving someone driving lessons. It all worked out pretty well though and I must have gotten decent lessons, because I'm a pretty decent driver and have had no wrecks or tickets.
One thing one friend who gave me a few lessons did (that she picked up from a friend) was play calm classical music quietly in the background. The music set a calming tone for the lesson, I think.
Posted by: Jordana at June 17, 2005 10:10 AMHmm. Guess I probably need to stash my Golden Earring and Sammy Hagar tapes...
Posted by: Terry Oglesby at June 17, 2005 10:33 AM