Get off the Sidewalk

Tell about how, when, and where you learned to drive, and any memorable experiences while learning.

I was not a good driver to start off with. I can only remember one time that my dad took me driving. He took me outside of town on the back roads between Joseph City and Holbrook. I didn’t do too terribly for the first part of the drive. At least from what I remember anyway. On the way back home there is one part of the road where there is a big curve before you go over the railroad tracks. I took the curve a bit too quickly and wasn’t paying very good attention and I almost drove us right off the edge off the curve.

Most of my learning to drive was done in Driver’s Ed. I liked this class and I did pretty well, as long as it was on the simulators. I would get way too nervous in a real car, but in the simulator, I was able to focus on just what needed to be focused on. In the real car there are just so many extra things to think about. I didn’t do that part of it well. When we did our driving test outside it was me, Mr. Sterkowitz and Maren in the car. Maren was a good driver and had no problems. I can’t say the same for me. Maren drove the interstate to Holbrook and around Holbrook a while. She then pulled into the Circle K parking lot so we could switch drivers. It got in the driver seat, put on my seatbelt, and promptly started to back up without checking behind me. I almost ran over some poor old man. I can’t remember any more specific details, but I just know it certainly did not go very well.

Because of my crazy experiences learning to drive, I waited a while even after my sixteenth birthday to actually get my license.

The first time I drove by myself after getting my license was to a church fireside. I drove our large van and had my younger siblings and a couple of cousins or friends with us. I decided that I was going to park quite far away from everyone else, because I was still very nervous about backing up. Everyone was being pretty noisy in the back of the van. I pulled into the parking lot and into the space where I wanted to park. Instead of pressing the break to stop the car, I accidentally pressed the gas. The front tires of the van went over the sidewalk and onto the grass. The headlights on the wall of the church were pretty funny, jumping up like they did. A few people were walking into the church as I did it, plus the people in the car were making fun of me. We will just say that it was also not a shining moment in my driving history. I backed up and finished parking and we got out of the car to check out the sidewalk. I had left two large skid marks on the sidewalk at the church. I was mortified.