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Dad goes into overdrive with daughter at the wheel

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By Jim DeBrosse, Staff Writer 4:09 PM Thursday, November 19, 2009

It’s hour 10 of my oldest daughter’s driving lessons with dear old Dad when she stops at the intersection of Hadley Avenue and Shroyer Road with the intent of turning south toward Dorothy Lane.

A white pickup truck is advancing toward us at high speed along Shroyer in the right-hand lane when my daughter, underestimating the pickup’s pace, decides to pull out.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” I shout from the passenger side.

My daughter instinctively hits the brake and we escape from the jaws of certain collision and death.

“Dad, don’t freak out! If you freak out, it makes me freak out, OK?! So don’t freak out!”

“I’m not freaking out! I’m just trying to keep us from getting killed!”

“You don’t have to yell!”

Dad takes a deep calming breath. “You just don’t have the experience yet. You’ll learn.”

She turns right safely on to Shroyer but oversteers and has to fight the wheel to bring the car back into its lane.

“OK, now what did I tell you about oversteering? Just accelerate coming out of the turn and let the car do the turning.”

“What do you mean let the car do the steering!? The car can’t turn itself!”

“After you make the turn, it does. Just let the steering wheel slip back through your hands, OK?”

She growls. “I still don’t know what you mean.”

“You want to practice again in a parking lot?”

“Now? We’re picking up (daughter number two) at The Greene, aren’t we?”

“Never mind. You’re doing great. Remember you have to get into the left lane to make your turn up here.”

She uses her mirror, glances over her shoulder and executes the lane change smartly.

She’s tensed and hunched over the wheel like an old woman. But better that than relaxed and careless.

“Nice job, sweetie. Now this is a bad intersection up here to turn left. There’s no turn signal, so be careful.”

“Great. You’re making me turn left at a bad intersection.”

“There are always going to be bad intersections. You have to watch the oncoming traffic, that’s all.”

She enters the left-hand turn lane and stops.

When the light turns green, she pulls ahead a little into the intersection and waits.

“Good. I think after that next car, you can go.”

This time she turns the wheel just enough, accelerates coming out of the turn and lets the wheel snap back through her hands.

“Perfect! You got it, sweetie!”

“OK, so why not just say ‘don’t turn the wheel so far.’ Why do you have to tell me all this stuff about oversteering and letting the car turn itself and blah, blah, blah, blah.”

Dad thinks a long time. “Good question. I guess it’s my first time giving driving lessons.”

“Boy, that’s for sure.”

MR. MOM JIM DEBROSSE

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