Driving lessons, part one
Learning to drive is considered a rite of passage for most teen-agers. For parents it's a lesson in frustration as well as a test of one's patience.
Before I was tall enough to reach the gas pedal I learned to drive Grandpa's four-wheel drive Ford pickup. We'd go to the pasture to feed cattle. He'd put the pickup in first gear and I'd steer while it idled forward through a set of deep ruts. He'd hop in the back of the truck, stand on the tailgate, and shove bales of hay onto the ground.
As my skills improved I got bored with driving in the ruts and "graduated" to making my own path through the pasture. I still couldn't reach the gas pedal and we idled along about three miles an hour.
The more time I spent behind the wheel, the more experienced I became (I thought) and I figured out how to make the pickup "go." I knew you had to push that long skinny pedal, but I wasn't tall enough to reach it.
Because I was a bit more impetuous in my youth or because I had an ornery sister, my driving lessons were suspended in a hurry one cool, fall morning.
We began the morning like usual — Gramps in the back, me driving, and my sister riding "shotgun." We were about halfway through the pasture when I sprang my brilliant plan on Brenda. I persuaded her to get on the floor and push on the gas pedal while I continued to steer.
I didn't consider the fact that Grandpa wasn't aware of my plan, and before I knew it, Brenda was on the floor, mashing the gas pedal to the floor as the pickup lurched forward at an alarming speed — probably all of 10 miles per hour.
Unfortunately, that was fast enough to unbalance Gramps and throw him out of the truck. As I said, that was the end of my driving lessons for quite awhile.
Like a lot of rural kids, my girls learned basic driving skills behind the wheel of Grandpa's car on dusty country roads on lazy summer afternoons.
The harder stuff, like driving in traffic and parallel parking, I've been forced to teach them. Dad doesn't quite have the patience to explain why you can't pass on the right or the discipline to bite his tongue when we barrel backward out of the driveway at 20 miles an hour.
Perhaps that's why it's best to leave the driving lessons to grandparents. After all, they've been through it before. And, practice does make perfect.
— DONNA BERNHARDT
