Malia’s Guide to Driving Safely

With a learner’s permit, the driving age is as low as fourteen in some states! I believe kids this young, even kids who are sixteen, don’t fully understand the dangers of driving and the risk of death when they begin to drive. To many teenagers beginning to drive, their focus is on what new car they’ll get, and being able to drive their friends around and blast music. The distractions come naturally when you are in a new space figuring out what to do. I know when I began to drive, I had a lot of anxiety, and it seemed every small thing distracted me. One day, early into my driving journey when I still had my permit, I was driving to work with my mom. My eyes were focused on the road. I was staring straight ahead, yet my mind seemingly wandered on its own. Before I knew it my mom was yelling “Red light! Brake!” at me brining me out of my trace and causing me to slam on my brakes just in time. I can’t even pinpoint what exactly took my mind but kept my eyes on the road, but daydreaming is one of the internal distractions of driving.

It’s important that people of all ages, but most importantly those new to driving who know very little, learn driving tips to help them be the best driver they can be. Teaching new drivers about the most common distractions and the potential consequences due to distracted driving would allow those ideologies to sit in the back of their minds as they drive. I believe the number of driving deaths is lesser known to new drivers; I’ve been driving for five years now, and I can honestly say I don’t even know that number. By taking the time to create courses, educational videos, pamphlets, etc. for driver’s to easily access, more people could take driving safely more seriously. It could also be that people who are educated in specific areas could recognize distracted driving patterns in cars driving around them in order to protect themselves from getting hurt at the hands of another. Oftentimes people don’t think “It’ll happen to them,” so they use this excuse to behave a bit more carelessly. It could even be as simple as parents taking the time to sit down with their children to discuss the dangers of driving with them. Overall, if people were more educated, careful, and observant then less driving related accidents would occur.

I’ve only been in one accident in my life, and it was very minor. I was on the bus on my way home from school, and the bus was stopped at a four way stop. It was our turn to go straight through when a car to the right of us also pulled out and ran into the side of the bus. Luckily everybody was okay, and there were no injuries. I’m not sure what caused the car to keep going when there was a bus in front of them, maybe they themselves were distracted and not focusing, or maybe they thought they had the right of way. As a kid I remember my early morning drives to school, me and my siblings in the backseat and my mom driving. She was new to Snapchat, and I have vivid memories of her taking selfies with the various filters on our drives to school. We took mostly less crowded back roads to school every morning, but I still remember my siblings and I jokingly telling her to pay attention and to stop “Snapchatting and driving.” Another scary driving concern is drunk driving. While drunk driving is supposedly heavily discussed to drivers, and we all know it’s something we should never do, people still take the risk and sometimes end up taking the lives of innocent drivers. I believe everyone should try and have access to some sort of drunk driving simulator where they can see themselves what it’s like to drive drunk. Visuals usually help people comprehend things better as their able to not only hear but also see what’s being discussed. If people are able to see how dangerous it is, maybe it would help them realize it isn’t something they should joke about and is in fact something that is so important. Every driver has a family and people who love them that they’re trying to get home to at the end of the day, and it’s so sad that some of these people don’t make it home to their loved ones.

Personally, I can also become more educated on the deaths related to driving, specifically learning the number of deaths per year and the highest cause of these driving related deaths. No one can say they never get distracted while driving, and things such as music, battling my broken aux cord, and attempting to eat and drive are my biggest distractions. I’ve begun listening to my music at a fun volume where I can still sing my heart out, but not keeping it so loud to where the volume is distracting me from the road. As for the aux cord, I need to just throw the towel in, and invest in a new one. I’ve stopped attempting to eat while driving because it’s hard for me to steer with one hand, and food is always falling on my clothes which is a distraction and causes me to look down when I need to keep my eyes ahead. Keeping up with minimizing the above distractions is the main way I can be a safer driver and protect myself and those around me. Talking to other drivers about what distracts them, and why it’s important to be as focused as possible could help my friends be safe on the road as well.