Driving with Dad

My head is spinning and my stomach is turning. “Can you lower the window, please?” I shout to the front of the car from the back of the Mazda minivan. Motion sickness is not fun, especially from the back seat of a van with three other screaming kids and an angry father. I put my head in my hands and try not to throw up. Life from the backseat is not a life lived, it’s a life tortured.

It’s the summer before my freshman year of college and I just got my license. School starts in 2 months and I still don’t have a car to get there. Public transportation conflicts with my motion sickness, busses, trains, planes, everything makes me want to puke.
Two blocks from my house there is a little red car with a for sale sign in the window. My father notices it and takes down the number and information. He liked the car, I personally could care less. At that time I didn’t think I would ever care what the car I drive in looks like, I just want to have that freedom to drive- period.
“The car is for sale, the guy wants $800 for it but I could probably talk him down to 7.” My father thinks he’s a master bargainer. “Its red, it’s a 1994, or is it 95? I don’t know. Mazda, they’re good cars. It’s in good condition. The guy said it has new tires, I think. There’s 139,000 miles on it. But for that price it will just get you from A to B.” I stare at my father as he continues talking about some piece of crap around the corner that I have still yet to see. “Oh! It’s also stick shift so I’ll teach you to drive it.” I look at him blankly. He walks away I mumble a sarcastic “wonderful” and he turns around. “Let me know if you want to buy it so I can call the guy.”
I had money left over from my graduation party a few weeks prior. I could just about afford the car with some extra cash in the bank to maintain a decent balance. If I bought the car I wouldn’t need to make monthly payments and the insurance estimated to be $600 a year. The car and the insurance were both pathetic.
We test drove the car. We meaning my father. I sat in the backseat. He wanted to make sure the car could handle some sharp turns and a little rough driving. I wanted to puke. The guy selling the car was really nice. The car was in pretty good condition for the age. There wasn’t a CD player but then again I don’t have very many CD’s and tapes are cheaper anyway. I went for the bumpy ride squished in the backseat of a two door Mazda MX3. I liked the car, but I didn’t want to learn to drive it. Not with my father at least.

My father has never had much patience. He was never good at helping with homework or listening to any of us tell a pointless story. If you can’t hit the highlight of a story in under three minutes, you lost him. My brother Ryan has always been a story teller, I think that’s why my father can’t stand him. He would start a story, tell you the whole background, the names of everyone involved including pointless characters and then proceed to include what each person had on their feet before he got to the conclusion, if their even was one. “Not right now” is something Ryan heard often.
When I was 6 my father took Ryan and me horseback riding. Ryan was 4. The man said not to put both of us on the horse at the same time. The saddle could only hold one child at a time. My dad knows more than the horse handler, so he put us both on. When the horse got irritated enough, he threw me off the back. I cried. My dad said, “What do you do when you get thrown off a horse?” I said “cry?” He said, “No. You get back on and keep riding.” I didn’t want to keep riding. I wanted to keep crying, but he knew what was best, so the horseback riding continued until our time was up.

“So you want to go for your first driving lesson?” My dad asks as I sit in front of the computer. I personally would rather continue chatting with my friends and looking up song lyrics than go driving anywhere with him. “Sure Dad. Let’s go.” I reply, trying to seem interested so I don’t get in trouble.
He jumps in the drivers seat and I in the passenger seat. This is the only time in my life I would rather be in the back trying not to throw up. Instead I’m in the front trying not to cry because I know what will happen when I don’t catch on quickly.
I never closely watched someone drive a stick shift before, never mind thought about driving one. Now I have to learn- and fast. He shows me how to start the car. “Press the clutch down, turn the key. Check to make sure the gears are in neutral. Then let go of the clutch to let the car warm up.” He’s talking and I’m trying to listen. Gears? Neutral? What is he talking about? I thought you turned the key and drove away. Now there’s changing and pressing different pedals and gears. Why are there three pedals? Stop, go and what? I begin to panic, but quietly. I cannot show my fear! Not to my father at least. If I can hold in the crying until I’m with Mom, I’m safe. Mom will never yell at you for crying. Only dad’s do that.
So my driving lesson from the passenger seat continues. He drives, I look out the window. My father glances over at me, “What are you looking out the window for?! Watch my feet! You can’t learn if you don’t watch!” So I divert my attention back to his feet. Press this one, let go to press that one on and on. He catches me looking out the window again. This time he pulls over and says, “Go ahead, you drive now.” I think great, now I’m in trouble. Maybe if his shoes were nicer it would have been easier to watch, but they weren’t so I just couldn’t pay attention.
He turned the car off and we switch seats. I only learned how to drive a few months ago and didn’t have much practice on an automatic, this was going to be impossible. I sit in the seat and adjust it to what I think feels right. He grows impatient. I look over at him and he’s fidgeting. “Ok. So how do I do this?” I ask.
“Well ya know if you were paying attention instead of looking out the damn window you would know!” he tells me. My throat tenses and I know that from this point on, things only get harder. I try not to cry yet. There really is no reason to cry except that I’d rather be sitting at the computer doing nothing than here with him. He tells me again how to start the car. My first lesson left me dizzy and nauseous. I stalled out more than I drove. I couldn’t believe how hard it was to drive stick. I also couldn’t figure out why anyone in their right mind would want to do all that work when there’s automatic cars in the world!
The next few lessons didn’t end as well. I usually came in from driving crying, and sometimes even left for the driving lesson crying. Once I finally got the hang of stop and go we moved on to harder things like hills. How hard could a hill really be? Well, much harder than I thought. I had no idea that a stick shift car would continue to roll backwards if you didn’t catch the first gear right. So backwards I rolled.
When I was finally good enough to drive on my own I took my car to work. I was still a little shaky on hills but never really drove anywhere that had serious hills. So I took my car to work, the other side of town, downhill. I left work, nervous because I knew that I would have to go up hills to get home. Well, I was definitely right to be nervous because I got stuck on the first hill I turned up. I called my dad crying. “I’m stuck on this hill and the stupid car stalled and I don’t know how I’m going to get home, I turned it on and it started rolling back! The E break isn’t even helping! Dad, where are you?!”
My dad came to get me. He pulled up in a truck behind my car and stayed on the phone with me. “Start the car, put it in first.” He began to coach me. “Stay calm, stop your crying! Just put it in first and gas it.” I did what he said and redlined the car all the way up the hill in first. I didn’t drive up that hill again for a very long time.
I kept the Mazda for over a year and then was given some money from a family member. I used it to put a down payment on a new car. I bought a Scion TC. It is a stick shift. I love the car, and I love knowing how to drive a stick. Despite how hard the lessons were with my father I still enjoy driving stick since I actually figured it out. Now I’ve been driving for a while and Ryan is soon to get his license. I asked him if he wanted to learn how to drive a stick shift. He said, “Yeah, can you teach me?” I laughed because I knew exactly what he was thinking. I had been there just two years ago. I felt the same dread of driving with Dad as he does now. I told him I would but I know my father will ultimately be the one to teach him. I don’t have much patience anyway.

The freedom I have from getting my license alone is beyond rewarding. Being able to drive a stick is even better. A lot of my friends have asked me to teach them, but secretly I don’t think I ever will because I like having a skill that they don’t, even if it’s one that was painfully acquired and dreaded at first.
I am glad that I no longer have to sit in the back seat and yell to the person driving to roll the windows down so I don’t puke. I am glad that my father took the time to teach me how to drive. I just wish that it could have been a more pleasant experience. But then again, maybe if he didn’t push me to do it, I never would have even learned. But I will never tell him that I appreciate it, I am far too stubborn for that.