It was 1969, my senior year in high school. I was seventeen but would turn eighteen in May. Everyone else was doing it, had been doing it since they were sixteen. But not me, the other girls in my class told me I was a baby, asked me what I was waiting for? What was I waiting for?
As my birthday drew closer, I made the decision I would do it. I would learn how to drive. But
Father’s old car
who would teach me, who? Well, the most likely candidate was my father, since he was the only member of my family who owned a car. My mother never learned how to drive. In fact, she seldom went in the car, except to the doctors, or the food store, and she didn’t go often.
My father was not an easy person to talk to. He was prickly like a porcupine, and you never knew what would set him off. He was in one word a grouch! In fact, his nickname in our family was” The Old Bear.”
So, the Sunday morning before my eighteenth birthday, I decided it would be D-day. The day I would ask my father to teach me to drive.
My father made his feelings about women driving no secret. He didn’t think that they should drive, could drive, or needed to drive. Up until now my transportation included my feet, my bike, and the bus, in that order.
So, as I sat down at the breakfast table after Mass, I cleared my throat and took a deep breath. My father was engrossed in reading the Sunday paper. He did not encourage talking at meals.
Nor did he encourage conversation, or other points of view. I had asked my mother’s opinion about talking to my father about driving. She said, “well I don’t know Susie you know how your father feels about girls driving. But I guess it can’t hurt to ask.
So, I did. “Dad, would you teach me to drive? You know I’ll be graduating from high school this year, and I’ll need to drive back and forth to whatever job I get.”
“Susan, you don’t have a car, so why would you need to learn how to drive?”
“Well, I countered, I can go on the bus back and forth to work, until I save enough money to buy a car. Then I would need to learn how to drive and get my drivers’ license. And then I wouldn’t have to take the bus anymore. I hate taking the bus. “ I said this all in one breath.
This wasn’t the best argument because my father worked for PTC. That was the Philadelphia Transportation Company; in other words, the Philadelphia bus company. He had been a trolley driver first, and then he was the head dispatcher for over thirty years. In other words, his life was all about the bus.
“You know Susie, if you are able to save enough money to buy a car, then you have to get insurance, in case you get in a car accident, did you know that?”
I had a very vague idea about that, from talking to some of my friends at school. “Dad I will get a job now, and start saving so by the time I graduate, I will have enough money to buy a car.” I had no idea if this was possible, or even where to buy a car, or how much it would cost. Up until now, the biggest purchase I had made was a movie ticket.
Just then my mother said,” Harry teach her to drive; she’ll need to learn at some point, why not now, before she graduates?”
I stared at my mother.I couldn’t believe she spoke up to my father. It was really unheard of. He rarely asked or wanted her opinion or anyone else’s. My father looks from my mother to me, and then with a loud sigh, he said, “OK, OK next Saturday, we’ll give it a try.”
Saturday arrived, and I was filled with excitement and trepidation. As I was finishing breakfast my father said, “all right, Susan get in the car, we’re going over to the Sears parking lot at the Moorestown Mall, and you will practice.”
As we pulled into the parking lot, my father said,” whatever I tell you to do, do it, nothing else.” We switched places in the front seat. My father explained how to sit properly in the seat, how to check the position of the mirrors, the signals, the gas pedal, and, most importantly, the brake.
“Susan, we’re just going to go from point A to B. Then, you will depress the brake, when I tell you, show me which is the gas pedal, which is the brake.” I was nervous and started biting my nails.
Off we went back and forth, back and forth, for about fifteen minutes. “OK Susan, now I want you to start turning the wheel, you’re going to drive in a circle.” I started to do that, although I didn’t make a perfect circle.
My father started yelling, louder and louder, “slow down, slow down, you’re going too fast. The louder he yelled the more nervous I got. I forgot which pedal was which. He told me to stop and, I hit the gas pedal hard by mistake. We started heading toward a little building, Sear’s Auto Parts.
My father’s yelling got me so flustered I smashed right into a pile of car tires next to the side entrance of the building. Which was lucky for us, because otherwise I would have hit the building itself.
I let go of the wheel, and the gas pedal, and that is when we stopped, and my father reached over and hit me on my arm as hard as he could. That was the end of the driving lessons. Without looking directly at me, my father said, “Get out of the car Susan.”
I got out, I was pretty shaken up, between the yelling, crashing into the tires, and then getting smacked. I could only remember my father hitting one other time, so I knew he was really, really mad.
I thought he was just going to drive away and leave me, but he said, Get in the back!”
After that, I asked my sister Betty to teach me to drive. She said she would. Even though she was married and had four kids. She found the time to teach me and take me to get my driver’s license test. The day I passed the test, I told my dad. And he just shook his head and said, “just what the world needs another woman behind the wheel.”