I didn’t write my regular, fascinating Monday update yesterday because I was driving.
In fact, have been driving for the past 2 days and sadly I am the only driver in this bunch. Our belief in not letting our kids learn to drive until they are mature and enough to carry that responsibility comes back to bite me when I’m on one of these road trips. I find myself thinking, “I wonder if I could just plop one of the girls in front of the wheel on a long stretch of nothing and tell her to hit the gas.”
That’s how I learned to drive. I was 14 and my grandfather was taking me home after spending the week with him. It was a three hour drive and about 20 minutes in he pulled over and said, “You drive.” I had never even sat behind a steering wheel before. Coincidentally, that is also when I learned several new curse words, since I spent the entire time going about 40 miles an hour and hugging the side of the road. I skimmed at least 2 mailboxes with the side of his truck.
When we hit my neighborhood he had me pull over and let him slide across so my parents wouldn’t see me behind the wheel. A few days later I let the cat out of the bag and told them I had driven all the way home. It was too exciting not to tell everyone. I don’t remember if they were angry or grateful, of maybe a little of both. There had to be some relief at not having to do the dreaded deed of teaching me.
Of course, that was the days of the horse and buggy and the highest speed limit was 55mph. You couldn’t do that today. We have speed limits up to 80mph in Texas plus the modern day police don’t take it as lightly when they pull over a teen with no license.
I kind of miss those days.
Especially when my legs start cramping up after 8 hours behind the wheel.
I kept humming the Beatles song, “The Long and Winding Road”. My kids always suspect I am making up these old songs when I get to the parts about pools of tears or “yeah, yeah, yeah.” They can not imagine that actually being a hit song and they will say, “Mom! If you didn’t make it up then it must be one of your awful 80s songs?!”
No….smarty pants! The 80s songs go like this, “867530-ni-eeen-yeeen…..” over and over and over. So there.
We will be here in Olathe, Kansas all week for the OYAN writer’s workshop. In fact, if you’re in the area, my friend Connie at Smockity Frocks and I are hosting a meetup on Thursday night. Leave a comment or message me on Facebook if you want to come and I’ll send you the info!
Have a great week!