Trust Issues
On the Road Again
Trusting myself enough to drive after 20 years away from the wheel
When I was in high school, I had a car. It was a Chrysler New Yorker, a responsible four-door sedan with a hint of sparkle to its exterior, as if it had been glazed in brown sugar and left to bake in the sun. (I’d really wanted my dad’s red Miata, a vehicle I was sure would transport me to the upper stratospheres of popularity at my Alabama high school, but my parents were no fools.) The Chrysler had plush, velvety seats, and it spoke to you, literally. If a door hadn’t been closed properly, a robotic voice would announce, “A DOOR is AJAR!” “A door’s not a jar,” we would tell it. Silly robot.
The high school version of me feels like a different person than who I am today. Even though passing my driver’s test was no easy feat — I broke into a cold sweat when asked to parallel park; who parallel parked in Alabama? — I felt pretty comfortable on the road, safe inside the spacious chamber of the brown New Yorker. Yes, one time I was pulled over when I ran a stop sign that I tried to claim was “too short,” and, yes, there were at least a few inebriated nights when I should not have been driving at all. But I was young and stupid, and I was unafraid. I pressed the gas and turned up the volume and I went. It all tasted like freedom.
