QOTD: Driving Down Educational Memory Lane?

Each one of you here in the peanut gallery learned to drive at one point or another. And whether that was via a proper driving school, or, perhaps for the older types, at the wheel of a friend or relative’s car, the memories are there just the same. Today we talk driver’s education and the car which withstood your naive mistreatment. It’s story time.

Botched gear changes, following distances, passing rules, jerky turns, squealing tires. Driver’s ed is hard on students, but harder on the cars. Long hours are spent in the classroom on books and videos, as instructors attempt to scare the speed out of you and replace it with pure caution and defensive driving. Did it work? A little.

I can remember how nervous I was when it was finally time to get behind the wheel. I’d been waiting so long for this moment — a validation on my driving excellence. The Audi 5000 was waiting as well, parked patiently on the street until I got my permit. In Indiana there’s a 30-hour requirement for classroom instruction, followed by six hours of time behind the wheel before a 15-year-old can apply for a permit. Surely my patience would be rewarded with a fantastic car with which to demonstrate my skills.

Uh, no. It was one of these. A circa 2002 beige Chevrolet Cavalier, in terrible Ace of Base trim. With an automatic transmission and air conditioning, it was bereft of performance. The Internet tells me it had a 2.2-liter four-cylinder that produced a shocking 115 horsepower. Those horses had to motivate 2,676 pounds of car, plus three teens and an adult. Sluggish and awful, I can remember how inferior it was to the 1987 Audi at home, even with its lifter-ticking inline-five engine. Summer temps in the 80s and 90s and a lack of window tint meant the air conditioning couldn’t keep the nervous sweat from the back of my neck. The driving part was tough, too.

The main problem that stands out all these years later is my initial lack of understanding where the center of the lane was. Especially on two-lane roads, my fear of hugging the center line and clipping an oncoming car meant I hugged the right side line, getting close to clipping mailboxes and signs. I did fare better than one of the other members of my driving group — an individual who found it incomprehensible that the wheel must be turned opposite to the desired direction of travel when reversing.

Let it all out; let’s hear about your driver’s ed experiences.

[Images: Ford, GM]