Driving Miss Crazy

Clear the roads, lock up your children and family pets, for the time has come. I regret to announce that the peace that was once prevalent along the quiet village roads of Sedgefield is a thing of the past. Why? Because our teenage daughter is learning to drive.

To put things into perspective I must start with a new ‘christening’. Up until this time my youngest offspring has been known as The MCM (Money Consuming Machine) but I must point out that other than a brief flurry involving 24 Million or so (I forget the exact amount) during the lead up to her matric dance, of late the poor girl has not been able to live up to this name. There simply hasn't been any money.

Every time she has gingerly reached for my wallet I have happily handed it over, because it's been empty. It's quite freeing actually. Even my debit and credit cards get happily dished out to any members of the family, because, well, you can't get blood out of a stone, can you?

At first I used to get frantic phone calls from shops / boutiques / restaurants “Hey, I keep trying to use the card you gave me, but it keeps getting rejected, it says 'Insufficient funds'.”
“That's funny,” I would answer, “It did that for me as well.”

So, back to the story at hand My daughter, has been newly named Fear Factor, (for reasons which have nothing to do with what we dread may be living underneath the detritus of clothing that lies on her bedroom floor), and is embarking on her first tentative wheelspins into the driving arena….. and alas, one of us has to go with her.

Actually 'one of us' is a bit misleading. It's me. And no, I didn't lose a bet, and I have no sadomasochistic leanings either. There's just no other choice. You see, despite her robust outward physique, and her ability to grow a beard in three hours, Mrs Ed shrinks into a quivering wimpy girl when it comes to being in a car with someone else driving.

Would you believe it? The same woman who has been known to stand down a charge of a heat crazed Zambezi Buffalo with a single shout, falls to pieces when she's a passenger in a car when anyone except her dad is driving. I have deep nail-gauges in my left thigh to prove it, and I'm mostly deaf in my left ear, thanks to the continuous barrage of screaming every time we drive anywhere.

We did try letting Fear Factor drive once when both Mrs Ed and I were in the car… just once. But it's very hard to calmly talk someone through the process of gear-changing and clutch operation when someone else is in the back seat alternating between screaming “We're going to die! We're going to die!” inside the car, and “Your going to die ! YOUR GOING TO DIE!” out the window at any unsuspecting pedestrians..

So no. I'm afraid I am THE ONE.

Which is odd in itself because whilst I consider myself a cool, calm and collected instructor, I have no delusions about my ability to drive. Indeed I have said it before - the reason I moved to Sedgefield is that my driving would fit in with everyone else's. It's that bad.

Of course this does not make me the best 'Master' to learn from, and in hindsight, perhaps the first lesson - an hour-long lecture on the intricacies of balancing a pie, a cup of scalding hot coffee (I allowed her to use warm milk whilst in training), a cell phone and a short story book (perfect for light reading at a red robot), with a diagrammatic instruction on knee-steering, was not something that will benefit her for the actual test, though it will doubtless come in handy for a life of driving thereafter.

Our car is not the best vehicle to learn in either. The EDGEmobile's replacement (an old Nissan 1400 bakkie) is making every effort to fill the big tyre tracks left by her predecessor, but (bless her rusted wheels) her doors do tend to swing open on a whim (or a passing cyclist for that matter) and finding the right gear is like trying to thread a needle in a bucket of custard.

Our inaugural venture onto the road went well for the first fifteen minutes, but then Fear Factor managed to get the car moving and, well, it was downhill from there.

You see there's one thing that a teenager hates more than driving badly, and that is being seen driving badly. That scores a minus four million on the Cool Scale. So when parked at a stop street (which, let's face it, is already a foreign concept in Sedgefield), the mere THOUGHT of anyone in the car behind said teenager, witnessing her stop-start attempts to get to the other side (which are strangely similar to a vomitous drunk lurching for the toilet .. or basin… or anything), sends her into stress level 17.

So how does Fear Factor deal with this? Quite simple really, if there is a car behind her at an intersection, she sticks her hand out the window and waves it on. Indeed she will only move if there is NO CAR IN SIGHT. Even if someone has innocently parked outside a home near said intersection, - perhaps visiting a friend… for lunch… - she waits for them to finish their last course, say their goodbyes, perhaps over a cup of coffee, and climb into their vehicle… then she waves them on.

So yes, we spend a lot of time at intersections waiting…. Waiting…. Waiting.

Once we are moving there is much more excitement. Apparently Fear Factor has a thing about making sure she keeps left. Extreme left. I think she may be a communist.

I see her point, it would be exceptionally unpleasant to hit an oncoming vehicle in the road. But I'm not sure if I agree that she should drive with the left half of the car on the grass verge either. It makes things extremely unpleasant for pedestrians, dogs, guinea fowl and anyone who has decided to trim their hedge that day. Worse yet, that's the side of the vehicle I am sitting in, so my terrified face is the last thing anyone sees as they dive for cover, I know this because one man, a painting contractor I think, stopped me in the supermarket and asked for his ladder back.

So if you are in Sedgefield and you see a white bakkie, with an even whiter passenger (easily recognisable by the motorcycle helmet i tend to wear) lurching along at either 13 or 185km per hour (depending on what gear we are in), please try and move to within the 5m building line of your property, or better yet, go indoors….. and close any street facing windows…