Generational Driving

Every time my mother drives, she’s constantly thinking about the next accident she’s going to get in. She views each of the cars around her with suspicion like any moment they could veer over into her or spontaneously combust into flames. Her car moves slowly through the road, cautiously. Like it’s waiting for some disaster to strike. Every new road we turn onto is a battlefield, and we are fighting for our lives. She turns to me and says, “I know I’m a good driver, but I don’t trust everyone else.” When I was a kid, I used to think that driving was easy. The easiest thing in the world. All you had to do was not text, look at the road in front of you, and pay attention. I never understood why there were so many accidents. I never understood why my mom lived in fear of the cars around her. It was so easy. That attitude carried me through my driving permit and my licensing test. It was easy. Driving was so easy. I still didn’t understand why accidents happened.

Not everyone was raised like me. They don’t have the same generational fear. They view driving as a passive activity, years and years of watching their parents treat the road like an afterthought. They grew up seeing people always driving in the fast lane, going 120 mph down the freeway. Their childhood road trips were filled with texting or being drunk or a million other dangerous things. It’s normal for them, they get frustrated when people drive any safer. They get mad when you’re going the speed limit or take the time to stop at a stop sign fully. The only way they experience the road is through this fast paced, exciting, wild game. They do the same things, because nothing bad ever happened to their parents, so why should it happen to them? They’ll just continue driving treacherously until it’s too late. Until someone dies from it. That was the only way they were taught. I’m not judging anyone who drives like this. It’s understandable. I wouldn’t even care how anyone drove if it wasn’t dangerous to others on the road.

It’s a privilege to grow up knowing how to drive well, having only seen the responsible side. I know this. I know it’s a privilege that not everyone has. If you’ve also experienced this privilege, consider yourself lucky. Not everyone grows up with the same morals instilled in them. This is the reason we need driver education. This is the heart of the matter. How would people know their actions are dangerous if their mentors did them? If they were taught it’s fine to text whenever or that they don’t need turn signals. Driving education instructs people who would’ve otherwise driven exactly like their parents to drive another way. It shows them the correct way of driving, a safer way, that they would’ve never had access to otherwise. Imagine if instead of just parents teaching us, one or two drivers education classes were required. If everyone was just taught a little bit about how to drive safely. The bare minimum. How many deaths would now be prevented? How many people would still be alive and walking around if we had the opportunity to educate every single driver on the road?

I’m a good driver. I don’t text, I follow all the regulations on the road, I look both ways before I turn. Yet, there’s still times where I’m tempted to just read a quick text message. Or check my Instagram if I’m only going 25 mph. I understand the temptation. We spend so much of our time driving that it feels like a waste since we can’t do anything else during it. I don’t ever do those things because I was raised to never do those things. I can’t imagine what kind of driver I’d be if I was never taught not to. If the only thing I was exposed to was reckless driving. I’ve never been in an accident, while I was driving or otherwise. I’ve been lucky enough to never drive with a reckless driver, unless you count some of my friends speeding. Most of my experience with bad driving has been with other people on the road. Once, a huge piece of wood fell out of a truck in front of me. It almost hit my window. People who don’t look before they merge. People who are distracted with music, their phones, or even their friends. A lot of the time, people don’t seem to understand the concept of not tailgating. They drive so close to my car, that I can almost make out the color of their eyes in my rearview mirror.

The way that I help others on the road is by being a good example. I let others in my lane if they need to get over. I follow the speed limit. I try to instill the virtues of safe driving onto anyone I know who is learning to drive. I never text. I try to be what my parents were to me, minus the fear of accidents. Drivers’ education is a remarkable thing because it gives people learning to drive an example of what driving looks like outside of their own social circle. It gives people a chance to learn how to drive safely, even if no one around them does. Plus, maybe if they learn then they can be a role model to the other people around them. The more people are aware of the consequences of dangerous driving, the safer the roads will be.