Driver’s Education

Driver’s Education

One of the most memorable rights of passage to adulthood for me was getting my driver’s license.  In the 70’s you could get a driver’s license in Illinois at age sixteen, if you successfully completed an approved driver’s education program and passed the driving test.  My High School offered a semester long driver’s education program to sophomores in place of gym class.  So for one semester of high school I actually did not suffer from athlete’s foot. 

The driver’s education program was run by the athletic department. I found it somewhat disturbing that the same people who used terms like; “attack the ball”, “punch it in” and “kill, kill, kill”; were also responsible for teaching sixteen year olds safe and responsible driving skills.

The classroom part of the program mostly involved reading and studying a small booklet provided by the state call “Rules of the Road”.  This was supplemented with several educational films with titles like; “Death on the Highway” or “So You didn’t See the Semi in Your Blind Spot”.  These films were created by adults and filled with gruesome scenes of car wrecks intended to scare the crap out of potential new drivers.  They did not work on sixteen year olds, who still saw car wrecks, blood, guts and gore as cool; not scary.  These films were not even filmed in color.  They were old black and white movies that were modified with an over abundance of red blood painted on the film.  I can honestly say these are the only black, white and red films I have ever seen.  After completing classroom training and passing the written portion of the state driver’s examination, I was given a learner’s permit.  This allowed me to actually drive a car under the supervision of a responsible adult.  I could say something here about the athletic department, but I don’t want to offend anyone.

For the next few weeks, the class was allowed to drive around a closed course constructed behind the school.  There were stop signs and intersections and an instructor screaming at everyone through two way radios installed in all the cars.  I believe the course speed limit was twenty; I doubt anyone went over ten. 

As part of the behind the wheel training phase of the program, everyone was required to complete two, on the street, driving lessons with one of the instructors.  With public safety in mind, these lessons were always scheduled early on Saturday mornings. Usually there were two students per lesson. One student drove for about half an hour while the other student sat terrified in the back seat; then they switched places for another half hour.  I had completed my first lesson without any problems and had no reason to believe the second lesson would be any different.

My second lesson started at 7:00 A.M. on a Saturday morning.  The car was a Buick Skylark coupe.  There were stickers on both doors, both bumpers and there was a giant sign strapped to the roof, all with the words “CAUTION - STUDENT DRIVER”.  The car was also modified with a brake pedal on the passenger side.  This was for the instructor to use in case of an emergency.  I didn’t know the instructor or anything about him except that he was the head baseball coach.  I was chosen to drive first.

I was about twenty minutes into my lesson, traffic was light and everything was going well.  As I approached an intersection with a traffic light; the light changed from green to yellow.  I hit the gas, the instructor panicked and hit the brake, the wheels locked, the car screeched and everything came to a dead stop in about twenty feet; everything except the sign strapped to the roof, which kept going.  In fact the sign slid all the way across the entire intersection without being touched or run over by any cross traffic.  It was truly an impressive feat and if I hadn’t been the driver, I am sure I would have fully enjoyed it.  Unfortunately, I was the driver and saw any hope of passing driver’s education disappear, along with the roof sign, across the intersection.  I felt sick.

When the light turned green, I pulled myself together, drove across the intersection and parked the car along side the sign.  The instructor told me to shut off the engine; I did.  Then he told both me and the other student to pick up the sign and place it in the trunk.  We did as we were told; me trying not to cry and the other student trying not to laugh his ass off.

After the sign was neatly stowed away in the trunk, the instructor told me to give the keys to the other student because I was “done for the day”.  I spent the next half hour hunched over in the back seat trying not to throw up.  I was totally depressed.  Not only was I a failure, but I knew this was the kind of event that could get around school and haunt me for years.

When we got back to school the instructor signed the other student’s completion slip; then asked for mine.  I handed it to him expecting him to rip it up or something.  Instead, he signed it, handed it back to me and said “I don’t know why we even use those roof signs; they come off all the time”.  

I was so happy, I almost peed myself.  I shook the man’s hand and said “thank you” for what seemed like five minutes.  I don’t even remember how I got home.  I think I took the bus, or I could have walked. I really don’t know.  When I got home, my dad was sitting in the kitchen reading the paper.  He asked “So, how did it go”.  Like a typical sixteen year old, I said “It was fine” and went to my room.