I wasn’t one of those kids who turned up at the DMV the day of their sixteenth birthday ready, eager and willing to get their beginners license. Of course I was aware that I had passed this milestone but I was in no rush to go out and do anything about it.
Maybe it was because I lived in a group home and there was a different kind of normal going on. There was no family car that I could take out and practice on, I would have had to had my social worker sign a billions forms to drive someone else’s car. It wasn’t worth the hassle.
Or maybe it was because, despite all indications to the contrary, I have never really been one of natures risk takers.
Whatever the reason my 16th birthday came and went, and then my 17th, and then my 18th.
Unfortunately in the plan that elapsed, between my 17th and 18th birthday’s, I was in a major automobile collision that came incredibly close to ending my life; that I didn’t die that night is nothing short of a miracle as far as I am concerned and one of the main reasons why I have not yet entirely given up on the notion of a benevolent god. But one of the many repercussions of that night was that I went from no interest in driving to a full blown phobia of driving.
Months after the accident I would have an anxiety attack whenever I got in a car, I was the worst passenger ever. I would get so upset driving anywhere that it would cause a fight between me and my boyfriend who I know was a very good driver but I would accuse him of being reckless and trying to kill me. We were teenagers driving around town, cruisin’ and looking for places to park should have been the highlights for us but instead it was pulling us apart until one day he had enough and he told me that I was never going to feel safe in a car until I learned to drive. I let him plead his case and it seemed to make some sense, plus I loved him and I was afraid that the issue was going to break us up so I conceded and I went to get my beginners and I enrolled in drivers ed at school. And the kick of it is, he was right. The first few times were a nightmare but when I got a little more comfortable I really started to enjoy driving… right up until the day of my road test. I still have no idea what happened that day. I made it TO the test but I couldn’t get in the car. I was completely frozen. I don’t know if I was afraid of an accident or failing or of the examiner, who pop culture has told me is a very mean man bent on making me cry, but that day my fear got the better of me and I quit. My beginners expired and life went on. I was more comfortable in the car so that problem was taken care of and as time passed it seemed like I didn’t really need my license. I did go back for my beginners a few times but I never made it back to the road test. It became my thing.
And then one day earlier this year I woke up and I was 36. 20 years had passes since I was first eligible for get my license, nieces and nephews were now getting old enough to drive and I started to think that maybe this was something I finally do for myself but I didn’t get a real catalyst until February and it came in the worst way.
On February 5th my brothers lost their father, the man I affectionately dubbed “Uncle” Walter. It was an awful time for my family and I was so incredibly sad for my brothers to have lost there dad who I know they loved so much. But the thing that hit me like a blow to the gut was watching Auntie Leona cope with the loss of her husband. I am a wife now and watching her struggle tapped into my deepest fear, something happening to my husband. Now Auntie Leona is not a young woman anymore and having been married for such a long time she had grown accustomed to her husband doing certain things for her, from operating all the high tech TV remotes to driving her where she needed to go and now she was scrambling to not only deal with the tragic and very unexpected loss of her husband but also to learn to turn on the damn tv. A few days after he had passed she pulled me a aside and hugged me and said “Maggie, don’t end up like me, go get your license right away. I have a perfectly good brand new car that I am going to have to sell because I can’t even drive the thing!” So I promised her. I admit that in the past I have made promises that I haven’t kept but something just keeps compelling me to keep this one; something about the look in her eyes and the conviction in her voice. When I go in three weeks to do my road test I am going to get in that car no matter how scared I am, I am going to pull myself together and drive. And you know what. I am going to pass. I am going to do it for myself and I am going to do it for Auntie Leona, ‘cause she believes I can.
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