BLOG: Early Morning Musings, Remember The Turn Signal

Shortly before we turned 16 years old my father and my buddy Jim’s father concluded independently of each other that it would be a good idea for us to take driver's training because that would earn us a break on car insurance rates. We considered this a joke, insofar as those aforementioned fathers had, in fact, taught us to drive when we were about 13. Nonetheless, we were duly enrolled in a summer driving class taught by the high school basketball coach. We signed up together so that we could drive together for a couple hours a week for six weeks.  The coach would sit in the back and snooze. We sat in front and took turns driving. Slick.

Now I do not want to come right out and say that this was a long time ago, but the driver training car was…wait for it…this is not a joke…an Edsel. It had a V8 engine, but it also had an automatic transmission which was operated via push buttons in the hub of the steering wheel, so it was never much good for burning rubber pulling away from a stop sign, the kind of behavior our instructor frowned upon but we attempted anyway.

I thought about that driver's training class last week when I attended the Driver Improvement Program Refresher Course offered by the Minnesota Highway Research Center.  I did the basic course three years ago, and to keep your certification you need to take a refresher triennially (I believe this is the first time I have ever used the word “triennially” in a sentence).  The course is offered for senior citizens for the sake of getting a break on auto insurance. I love the symmetry here: I took driver training as a teenager to cut insurance rates, and now I take driver improvement as a senior citizen to cut insurance rates.

I learned a few helpful or at least interesting things in the Driver Improvement Program Refresher Course.  I learned that even an experienced instructor can get flummoxed by an unfamiliar DVD machine. I learned that the preferred way to grip the steering wheel is now approximately 8 and 4 on a clock face, rather than the 10 and 2 I learned as a youth (This is to protect the driver from getting his or her arms smashed by the air bag, should the air bag choose to deploy for some whimsical reason).  I learned that when approaching a merge, the DOT prefers that drivers wait as long as possible and then “zipper” their way in at the very end, the kind of behavior I have always preferred to curse and honk my horn at. I learned that while it is a good idea to turn your turn signal on, it is also a good idea to turn it off. Our instructor was a veritable font of knowledge.

One part of the discussion stirred my memory and imagination.  The instructor asked what the distractions were when we began driving, and what the distractions are today. For “the old days” the list was fairly simple: Other people talking in the car, the radio, eating and drinking. For today the list grows to cell phones and texting and Ipods and MP3 players and video players and GPS systems and all like that.  But this misses out on the one major distraction that tormented me when I had my first driver’s license, and I did not have the nerve to bring it up.

For me as a 16-year-old driver the number one distraction when I was behind the wheel was girls. If I saw a female person between the ages of 15 and 25, say, outside my car, either walking on the street or riding in another car or whatever, I lost all concentration. As a matter of fact, I went through a total metamorphosis a la the Incredible Hulk. I knew, you see, as all guys my age knew, that girls went absolutely nuts for guys who drove recklessly and much too fast; that their hearts melted when you squealed away from a stop sign or screeched to a halt three inches from the bumper of the car in front of you. We had seen the movies with guys in black leather jackets roaring down city streets, and we fantasized that we were them, even if we were driving Edsels and wearing bow ties. It is a miracle that any of us survived.

I must admit that I am still interested in impressing the girls when I drive, especially the one who is usually sitting next to me, to whom I have been married since LBJ was president. But at this stage in life you don’t have to burn rubber or tilt yourself up on two wheels to impress the girls. If you can still drive at night, you’re a hot commodity. And if you remember to turn off that turn signal, you can be king of the world. At last.