I am teaching my seventeen year old son how to drive a car.
He has his learners permit, though ‘permitting’ him to take control of the family sedan which contains the life of me and his little siblings is quite the challenge.
Yes, I’m afraid. I am however a lover of risk.
Thankfully.
I threw him into the drivers seat of our second family car – a small, five speed, manual Daihatsu. It felt like I was throwing my first born to the lions.
I had driven us to a secluded and underdeveloped section of a new housing estate and I pulled the car over to the side of the road and said, “Right, let’s go.”
He looked at me with the eyes of a lost man.
My instincts were correct, he is a good driver though knows everything.
A few near misses soon brought him back to reality.
Yesterday, I allowed him to drive ‘my baby’. My car is a Subaru Forrester. Turbo. With flared guards, a low front and nice wheels. It’s an automatic, so it basically drives itself.
He managed to veer off the edge of the road, flirt with the gravel, over steer and end up back on the other side of the road with a wobble of the vehicle, which for a few seconds scared the shit of me. Almost.
I reached for the steering wheel and pulled it sharp left.
Keep on your side of the road mate.
There was no oncoming traffic, though a few cars trailing closely behind us and I might assume that they might’ve assumed that the driver of our Subaru was drunk.
It appeared that way I’m sure.
Dear world, please note the yellow LEARNER plate which has once again fallen off the back window.
It’s necessary for us to teach him how to drive, as well as paying for driving lessons with an instructor, because learner drivers now need a total of one hundred and twenty hours practice within Victoria, Australia, before they can apply for their probationary license.
It’s a different process to when my mother first learned to drive. She tells me the local police officer laughed when she almost killed them both and so then flicked her a license in the 1960’s. She may have flirted with him.
It’s different again to when I obtained my license.
My driving instructor and testing officer weren’t good looking at all and I’m not that much of a flirt. Plus, my driving instructor was female and she played opera music whilst I drove.
It unnerved me greatly.
My mother taught me how to drive and I also had lessons. I did practice in both an automatic transmission and a manual, though I obtained my license with an automatic. Not the gun.
That was twenty two years ago. These days, you have to choose which transmission you’re going to drive.
He is going to drive a manual car.
Every male should know how to drive a manual car.
Actually, I believe EVERYONE should be able to drive a manual.
There’s a difference in skill.
I think there’s more control over the vehicle when you’re driving a manual.
Although, luxury cars these days are lovely to drive when they’re automatic and it’s so much easier especially if the car is filled with children and McDonald burgers which need the pickle removed at traffic lights or a milk shake which requires standing up again after it’s spilled all over the rear floor mat.
See, you need more hands.
Anyway, I digress. This isn’t a road traffic authority blog.
It’s about being a mother.
So, this mother was more than a little tense sitting in the front seat of the family sedan, whilst a seventeen year old son drove.
He took a few corners with too much speed, which resulted in him entering into a suburban street in the wrong lane.
Fortunately there were no other cars driving in the opposite direction.
He crunched the gears, let the clutch out too fast, too slow, bunny hopped well and didn’t grip the steering wheel correctly.
Plenty of time to look cool later mate.
By giving him the opportunity of driving a manual transmission first and then having a drive of the automatic, he was able to choose which he preferred.
“It’s boring driving a manual.”
Ah yes, that worked well.
On our fourth driving lesson, we argued.
He asked me if I was premenstrual.
I was, but that was beside the point.
YOU’RE NOT LISTENING TO ME !!!
(note to self: from here on in, don’t give driving lessons in THAT week)
After some suggestive points for consideration, he stopped the car sideways in the middle of the supermarket car park and got out whilst huffing. Leaving the door open and the car idling.
“You can drive home”, he said whilst pretending he didn’t really care.
Great.
I tried to make him get back in the drivers seat but you can’t make a teenager do things they don’t want to do. Especially when they’re trying to prove a point.
So, I drove the car home, all premenstrual and silent.
I drove a little faster than I should and tried to impress him with my Ferrari like skills.
Note how I’m using the gears unnecessarily? I’m trying to impress you. I can change gears up and down at every corner and turn and I don’t even have to think about it. I can check the rear view mirror, change gears, drive with one hand AND have the stereo up loudly. If you didn’t get out of the drivers seat son, you’d be driving like this.
“Mum, you’re speeding, this is a residential zone and you can only do fifty kilometres an hour. You’re doing seventy.”
Right.
Teaching someone you love how to drive is a challenge.
There is a fine art to appearing confident, giving confidence, remembering to relax your white knuckle fists in your lap whilst trying to stop the instinctive push of your foot into an imaginary break peddle on the passenger side floor.
What Mum? Relax Mum!
Fantastic mate, excellent, you’re doing really well.
I am certain to offer plenty of praise and some decent scare tactics.
Yes, if the right hand front corner of your car hits the front right hand corner of an oncoming car it is considered a head on collision and both cars will spin into oblivion.
My life is in your hands now.
An accident can cause death or worse I may end up in a wheel chair and you’ll have to care for me for the rest of your life.
Don’t hit the edge of the road because you’ll get caught in the gravel and the car could shoot off sideways and into a tree or it might roll.
Don’t over steer.
Keep both hands on the wheel.
Turn the music down, you need to hear the engine so you know when to change gears.
Listen to the engine, can you hear how it sounds like it’s about to blow up? That’s right, you need to change gears now.
What gear are you in? I don’t know, you’re driving.
No, that’s reverse. You can’t go into reverse whilst you’re doing eighty kilometres.
Don’t dangle your thumb off the steering wheel like that.
BREAK! BREAK! BREAAAAAAAAAK!
It’s hot in this car isn’t it?
Don’t worry about your iphone.
Yes, I’m taking a photo of you driving, don’t worry just keep driving. Oh, you look so grown up.
Oh, your eyes look closed in that photo.
Are you driving with your eyes closed honey?
I’m sure he can’t wait until the day when I’m no longer travelling in the car beside him. I remember when I was younger I couldn’t wait to zoom off, out into the world on my own, without anyone instructing me.
It was out there that I made plenty of mistakes and learned well.
A few scary episodes challenged me to drive both carefully and more skillfully.
So many of our youth lose their lives on the road.
Over confidence and distraction lead them to tragedy.
I am fortunate that my son has an extremely wise head on his shoulders and will be driving a good car.
The rest, lays within the hands of the universe and his driving.
I’m not sure how many fingernails I’ll chew down on the day that he obtains his license and drives off and out into the big adult world of roads and highways and hoons and slow-down-out-there-it’s-raining. Without me.
I am learning to let go, though instinct tells me to hide him away and buy him a new pair of sneakers.
Fred Flintstone had the right idea. He ran everywhere with his car. He could only drive as fast as his little fat legs could run.
My son and I are going out driving again tonight.
I’m just warning you, so you can keep off the roads.
I’m not premenstrual though, so he will drive well.
Toot Toot.
motherstuff 