My last speech at my Toastmasters Club:
Can you remember the excitement of your first time behind the wheel? When I turned 15 I counted the days until I was 15 ½ and could get my learners permit. My dad bought me a ‘56 Chevy so that I wouldn’t have to borrow his car. Right away I started working on it, learning to change the oil, kept the battery charged as I would listen to the radio as I worked on it. Every boy’s dream is a set of wheels to customize and make his own.
I passed the written test the first time out and signed up for drivers training class at my high school. They had those huge Plymouth Fury 3 sedans, learning to parallel park it was like docking an ocean liner! My first time at the wheel I was about to enforce my right of way at an uncontrolled intersection and the instructor jammed on his brake to let the offending motorist cross in front of us. It all worked well though no harm no foul- then that day after school before my folks got home from work, on the sneaky- sneaky I drove my Chevy out by myself to the store and back. I must have been Barney Oldfield an early twentieth century race car driver in my past life- I’m a natural born driver.
My mother worked at the Broadway department store and didn’t drive so she took the bus to work- since we lived near Roscoe Blvd. on which the store was located, one bus would get here there. Now I had a license and my own car so I wanted to pick her up at work, I was so grown up now. The first time I was so excited that as she was still getting into the car with one foot still on the ground- I stated to drive away!
Then where was the time that I had been customizing my car’s appearance and had left the nut off of the steering wheel- well it has splines holding it in place on the steering column or so I thought. We went over a bump and the wheel jerked off- scaring my Mom.
You read about teens in terrible motor accidents – in spite of my youthful immaturity I didn’t get in one auto accident as a teenager. The years have clicked bye and suddenly it seemed I had teenagers of my own that were coming of age to learn to drive- first Brad and then Alexis. While their school offered behind the wheel training, I took them out driving and they could drive before they started the course.
The first time out I would take them on the weekend to their school where we would practice in the parking lot. Once I was satisfied that each could operate the car with out hitting the fence, could keep it under control, turning, braking, swerving, backing up and parking it was time to drive on the street.
I think that when you first start driving your concentration is on operating the vehicle and traffic is a distraction. Tucson has many new housing developments going up with no one living there yet and few cars. So after the parking lot this is where we resumed practice.
Brad’s first car was a Toyota sport truck which I bought cheap. It had a 5 speed stick so he had to learn to use the clutch and row through the gears manually. Once his competency was established we started to drive out on the busy streets such as Ina and Oracle. We were in the parking lot there and he wanted to turn left to travel west bound on Ina. Pointing to the island separating the east and west bound lanes I asked Brad what the island was for? Realizing his mistake he proceeded to turn right and then get in the left hand turn lane there so as to make a U turn. Another time he was traveling north on Oracle and wanted to turn left on Ina so he proceed to enter the left turn lane- except he entered the one for the side street at the south end of the shopping center- realizing it instead of swerving to the right and reentering the left lane on Oracle he drove straight and entered the opposite hand left turn lane. We now are going against the flow of traffic on Oracle! Brad! Stop!
I bought an Isuzu Impulse to drive to work- it had an automatic transmission so Alexis was able to learn and not have to deal with the clutch. She graduated from the parking lot and then we did this subdivision at Cortaro and Oldfather. There were quite a few streets and they had just started to build there so it was perfect. There was this particular security guard who stopped us one day- I thought it was funny and Alexis was angry. But he never bothered us again- even after I sped past him at 45 MPH when we left that day.
The day Alexis first started driving in traffic, she started at the Walgreens at Overton and Thornydale. She drove east to La Colla, north to Tangerine Road and then proceeded west on Tangerine. That’s where the incident occurred. A motorist in a pickup truck was behind us and started to tailgate Alexis. After about a mile, he passed us accelerating then slammed on his brakes causing Alexis to stop behind him. He then starts to get out of his truck- so in response I opened the car door and started to get out of our car. When he saw me get out he then immediately got back into his truck and sped off. Alexis then said that she wouldn’t do that again- I asked her: “What won’t you do again?” Alexis said she didn’t like him tailgating her so she flipped him the bird behind my back.
As she was pulling into the parking space at Walgreens it seemed to me that she was still going too fast so I yelled – Stop! On a dime she came to a complete stop just a few inches from the bollards. “Alexis do you know what those pipes are sticking up from the pavement?—they are Bollards- embedded below the surface as deep as they are above and are filled with concrete.” Had you hit them over 5 MPH it would have been the end of this car!
When my dad was 92 he was still driving and didn’t have the sense to know that it was time to give it up. He had this beater 72 Dodge Dart that was always breaking down and leaving my parents stranded. My mother was dependent on him and wouldn’t do anything about it. I was worried about them and every time I’d hear about a senior citizen evolved in an accident it would feed on my anxiety. So I found a job near their home and moved back to Los Angeles. One day I saw on the news where one such senior driver hit many people in a pedestrian mall in Santa Monica. I was thankful that my father wasn’t the driver.
I now have over 40 years experience driving without a serious injury and I’ve never been sued. I’m a natural born driver!
