Driver's Ed: The Pain. The Agony.

To get our license on your birthday; that is every sixteen year old’s dream. The best is when your parents call you out of school for the morning so you can take the test. Then you can return at lunch and show off your shiny piece of plastic.

That is if you actually pass the test.

My story wasn’t so romantic. I did not get my license when I was sixteen. I also would not have had the option to show off the plastic at the lunch table. Nope, I have a summer birthday. Instead when I was sixteen I got to watch all my friends come to the table with their new licenses. (Amazingly they all seemed to pass on the first go-around). I also had to have all my friends pick me up when we went out. That part was cool. The lame part was that my curfew was a good hour earlier than all of theirs so my parents always had to come get me. It was like I was the ‘uncool’ kid who had to be home by 10:30p.m.

The worst was – it wasn’t my fault.

The Drivers’ Education classes were offered in the fall – I swam; then offered in the winter – I had indoor soccer; then offered in the spring – I had softball; and then offered in the summer – I worked. So the pattern continued this way for what seemed like forever. Yes, I watched my sixteenth year come and go – no license. I then watched what felt like my whole seventeenth year go by. Okay, only half of it, but still.

I enrolled in the class that winter. Our indoor soccer team must have fizzled out so I could. One of my other friends was in the class with me. We were the only SENIORS in a class with sophomores. (You could actually take the class at fifteen, just couldn’t get your license until you were sixteen.) It was an embarrassment to my name to be in that class with kids in my brother’s grade. A truly mortifying teenage experience.

The class was all right. Mr. Diet Mountain Dew and Licorice ropes (I kid you not) was kind of a tool, but whatever. It was the behind-the-wheel classes that sucked. [This is where the part of being the oldest of five kids comes into play… My parents never had time to actually take me out to practice driving until I started the class. And even when I was in the class, I still didn’t get enough practice as I should have.] Mr. Mountain Dew constantly reminded me about the importance of practicing. Naturally he did this while slamming on the emergency brake.

My first “spin” with the car was winding around through the ‘burb. That was actually kind of fun. Why go 20mph around the curve, 35-40mph was so much more fun! Yeah, that day was a blast. I thought I was already ready for the test. I realized very quickly that I was not. The next session involved driving downtown Milwaukee. I am surprised I did not have a heart attack, or for that case the kid in the backseat and the driver didn’t. It was horrible! So many one way streets. So many people. And so many frickin’ cars! Those classes eventually got better. And, we never drove around downtown again – just around safely in the ‘burbs. Ah – that was easy as pie!

Well, the class eventually ended – I passed. I got “poor/fair” marks for my driving. I wasn’t honestly all that bad. Mr. Mt. Dew just made me nervous; understandable considering he was always juiced up on sugar. I actually remember being sore about those marks. If he could see how I parallel park now, he’d surely change it to ‘superb/excellent’ driver.

Fast forward to, after significant practice, the drivers test. Gasp! I remember feeling as nervous as I would for final exams or right before my relay at a swim meet. It was as if I had forgotten what side was the brake and what side was the gas. (Well, not quite so bad – but nerve-racking it definitely was.).

So nerve racking, I’ll have to continue shortly….

Beep Beep

Ah, the Flintstones...owners of the original hybrid. Oddly, it also closely resembles my first car, except mine was slightly more boxy. That's right: my first car was a station wagon, wood paneling included.

I can only imagine the terrible paradox a parent experiences before a child is about to get their drivers license. You've spent 16 years carting their asses around, and now here is your light at the end of the tunnel. Oh, how nice it would be to spend a night at home watching ABC's Monday night lineup with a glass of wine rather than freezing your bum off waiting for your kid to finish hockey practice. But do you really trust them...? Really trust them with your car?

If you are smart, no, you do not. Borrowing your child your car will most surely end in disaster and destruction -- it's really just a matter of when it will end in disaster and destruction. In my case, it took exactly 30 days, a slurpee, and a couple trees.

I was riding with my sister that fateful night, and before I go into detail on what happened and how it could have been avoided, a brief history of the relationship between my sister and I from ages birth - present: we fought a lot, yet insisted on hanging out together all the time. It would be safe to say we are both relatively extremely stubborn, and are not to keen on losing anything --- especially arguments.

Well, mid-driving, the slurpee hits the floor, and thus the inciting incident:

Liz: you IDIOT!!!! it's all over!!!!

Me: it's not my fault!!! don't blame me!!! There was a malfunction with the cup holder, obviously!!!

Liz: You are a clumsy buffoon.

Me: *grasping for the cup on the ground* Don't help me pick it up or anything!

Liz: I didn't drop it!!!!

Me: *head under the steeling wheel trying to retrieve slurpee* I am NEVER driving you ANYWHERE ever AGAIN!!! You are useless!!!

Both in unison: OH. MY. GOD!!!! Aggghhhh!!!!
*crash into trees*

So, it turns out I won that argument -- I didn't get to drive her anywhere for quite some time. Because I had just totaled my parents car.

No, they were not pleased with me, and to my horror, my next car ended up being another station wagon, except with more rust on it than the last one. I would have to say the worst part about it though is that this single incident established my reputation as the "bad driver" in my family/circle of friends. My brother has totalled approximately 3 cars (one of them the aforementioned 2nd station wagon) and rolled several others in his 5 years of having his license (and for 2 of those years, his license was suspended), yet I remain the bad driver. Another interesting tidbit is that though I was the "bad driver", I always somehow ended up being the driver. If a group of friends went out, though all of us had cars, I ended up driving while they heckled me from the back seat for being a "bad driver". Why didn't I ever tell them to shut their pie holes and that they can drive their owns cars if they hated my driving so much, I will never know....

However, though I have never been in another major accident since the fateful forest expunge of '99, to rid myself of my reputation is a battle that I don't think I will ever win.