You did WHAT, while you were behind the wheel?

Texting. Eating. Putting on make up. Fighting with the person in the back seat. READING? Playing POKÉMON GO? Yes… sad but true, I have heard stories of people I know doing all of these reckless and crazy things while driving. 

am the proud owner of a NJ driver’s license, for just a few short weeks in fact. It was not easily gotten. I had to take the driver’s test three times in order to pass, but I’m thankful that the instructors were so hard on me, because I definitely wasn’t ready almost a year ago when I took the test for the first time, although I was so hopeful and so very disappointed.

education I received in school during my health class was very useful in setting me on the path to be a safe driver. Learning all the rules of the road is essential for a new driver. Knowing how to follow road signs and traffic signals and how to interpret the stripes on the road are critical to keep everyone safe, so that we are all on the same page when it comes to how to make the car go where we want it to go.

But words on a page can only go so far. In my state of New Jersey, I had to take 6 hours of instruction with a driving school behind the wheel in order to get my permit. There’s a whole different world between pictures of the road in a book and the street out in front of me through my windshield. There are so many distractions. So much motion and activity. So many other cars, especially here in New Jersey! 

I learned so much more listening to the driving instructor as we cruised just at the speed limit through my local neighborhoods and on the main roads near my home. How to use the mirrors and signals. How to try to anticipate other drivers and what they are going to do. How to think one step ahead – there’s a stop sign 50 feet ahead of me, time to start thinking about slowing down, who is behind me, in front of me, next to me? So much to think about, it’s overwhelming.

Practicing with my parents was critical in the learning process. Jumping in the car with my permit to get some ice cream for an after dinner snack or running to Target for paper towels brought the reality of being behind the wheel really into focus for me. How many people start a simple trip like that and end up in a fender bender, a massive collision or even a tragic life ending accident. How can that happen and why does that happen?

The only accident I have ever been involved in was, thankfully, a small one. My dad was driving, and was stopped to make a right from a busy main town thoroughfare onto a quieter side street. He had his blinker on and was waiting to turn when we heard brakes squeal and saw the car behind us slamming to a stop and swerving so that they were almost off the road behind us. Whew… we thought, crisis averted. Then BANG – the car behind him slammed into him at 40 miles per hour without even trying to stop, and the car behind us slammed into our passenger side hind end and moved us 25 feet down the road. My brother and I were thankfully wearing our seat belts and we were not injured although the car was not drivable afterwards.

Two guesses what the car behind us was doing. Yup, he was on his phone, and two guesses what the car behind him as doing? Yup, he was texting and didn’t look up in time to even see the car in between us slam to a stop, and hit him without even trying to brake. 

This could have been a disaster. This could have ended in death instead of just three broken cars, my dad’s sore neck, and the dozen broken eggs that my mom had in her lap after our grocery trip, thinking they’d be safer than in the trunk. Instead, it was a huge lesson for me of the dangers of phones in cars in any capacity but especially for any kind of reading or texting activity. Driving requires 100% focus, and you lose so much of that focus with your phone distracting you in any way. 

For me, the phone will never be a distraction. I learned my lesson. And I preach this lesson over and over to my friends if I see them doing anything as stupid as even thinking about touching their phones when they are behind the wheel. If there was some way to prevent phone access to teenagers especially when driving, some app that parents could install that would prevent texting or anything phone related except a small list of emergency phone numbers for calls, that would go a long way toward stopping small accidents like the one I was in, and much worse accidents like the ones that take the lives of teenagers and adult drivers across America every day. You can wait to catch that Pokémon in Pokémon Go until you’re home, but if you never get home, you’ll never play Pokémon Go or anything else, ever again.