Recently I spoke to someone at an
office party. The conversation somehow moved
to roads, which gave me cause to reveal that I had never learnt how to drive.
This caused this someone to erupt into a violent chuckle. He sincerely apologised
as he tried to control his laughter, managing to force a cough in order to stabilise
himself after the shock of meeting a grown man who is incapable of controlling
a car. I thought I’d better learn.
The last time I was behind the
wheel of a car was when I was 19. I had five lessons, where I more or less
learnt how to move a car forward. I’ve put it on the backburner for the last
few years. This backburner has been fuelled by a range of highly unoriginal
excuses, such as it’s bad for the environment, having car is really expensive,
I’ll never use a car, etc.
So why don’t I drive? In addition
to being plain lazy, driving seems like something from an alien world. The length of the time that I have spent not driving
has made the idea of me being in the driver’s seat seem completely
unfathomable, something that I just don’t do. I’ve also been in five car
accidents, all of which occurred before I was 12, which I suspect may have
embedded in me a deep rooted reluctance to drive.
My renewed enthusiasm for getting
behind the wheel made me particularly interested in an episode of This American
Life, called ‘How To’. In ‘Roadrunner’, Ira Glass teaches Sarah Vowell how to
drive. (Skip to 06:40 to get straight to the Sarah Vowell piece)
This is a fantastic piece of
radio, since it bounces two great institutions of American radio off each
other. Ira Glass, the eekingly
inquisitive host of the show. Sarah Vowell, who has the ability to deliver
bitingly sardonic observations, all the while in her peculiar voice, which
makes her sounds like a cross between a
small child and what I’d imagine a teddy bear would sound like if it suddenly gained
the ability to talk.
 |
| Ira Glass |
It reminds me of when I first
learnt to drive in the congested roads of Tooting Broadway. After a few minutes
of tuition I was put in charge of the car. I didn’t experience the much lauded joy
of driving. Instead, I felt as if I had inappropriately been entrusted with a
weapon, capable of wreaking havoc, inflicting damage and maiming members of the
public. As Sarah Vowell explains in the episode, “Driving is my greatest fear.
And it's not a totally irrational fear. There are things about driving that are
in fact dangerous, like learning to pass another car without hitting it.”
Sarah Vowell also sprouts
wonderful rants on the evils of the car, on how the “car class” builds a
destructive society that lacks in adequate public transport and guzzles fossil
fuels. Such incoherent and nonsensical diatribes would be familiar to anyone
who has asked why I don’t drive. You see us non-drivers like to make the best
of our situation whenever we can. We are not lazy; we are financials geniuses
who have carefully calculated that buying a car, paying for petrol and scouring
for parking is something that only fools would indulge in. Furthermore, we are not
too incompetent to pass a test; instead we are pillars of morality, eco-warriors
who are the only ones willing to righteously stand up to those evil oil conglomerates
and announce “No”.
 |
| Sarah Vowell |
Listening back to her
panic-fuelled recording in the car, Sarah acknowledges the absurdity of her reasons,
saying “I don't know who that humourless fanatic was. Though in my defence, I
was grasping for any reason to get out of this driving mistake. Let me assure
you that I care about fossil fuels precisely as much as everyone else in
America…. which is to say not at all.”
When I restarted my driving
lessons last Friday, it felt completely different from before. It felt more
natural. I think my teenage anxieties had left me. Perhaps my adolescent apprehension
has been replaced by the hot headed hubris of the young adult.
I suspect it feels easier because
driving is something I’ve developed a genuine interest in. Sure, I’m learning partly
because it’s something I feel I’m obligated to do as part of the general human-experience.
However, I’m increasingly drawn in by all the possibilities that driving
offers.
