I’m ready now. I’m ready to ride the world’s biggest roller coaster – a big powerful roller coast reaching 70 miles per hour, tipping, turning, spinning, hurling. The idea is mind boggling but I’ll take the plunge.
I’m trying to make my bargain with God but I know what he really wants me to do is get in the car and take my 15-year old daughter for her first “real” driving practice since receiving her learner’s permit. The new laws were set and enforceable – for the next nine months in the State of Illinois, I would get behind the wheel with my newbie driver. It was suggested that this might be a type of bonding process.
Would my daughter, Christine, feel like bonding with mom who is sweating and hyperventilating and praying towards the sky? Only time would tell.
First of all, I have to say, I feel jipped right from the get-go. Where’s my brake? The driving instructor had a brake. This doesn’t seem fair at all.
There should be special cars for new drivers to ease the stress on their first passenger (Am I the only boomer who can’t shake the term “suicide seat?”) These special cars should come equipped with one extra gas pedal, one extra brake and one extra steering column – oh yes, and one extra radio station.
Do you think I trust my daughter? Absolutely! But please remove all other drivers from the road – at least for a while. I’m also from the era of “Watch out for the other guy.” I don’t trust nobody in no other car, no-how, no way!
And so I begin this new journey full of trepidation yet fully aware of the merits of a positive mental attitude.
My daughter gets in our 2002 Ford Focus beaming with anticipation. She gingerly backs out of the driveway and for a moment I reflect on my own first driving experience and those very first thoughts. “This is fun! This is exciting! … Why the heck does mom look so uptight?”
By Clean Comedian Sally Edwards
comedybysally.com
