Driving...Again

Okay, I can't think of a better topic so we are going to talk about today's driving escapade.

For the past two days, I've been driving our minivan because my dad takes our Toyota to work. Well, today, I got to drive the Toyota because we didn't get to go out driving until after dad was already home. So mom drove me over to the mall, and I drove around in a parking lot for a while and on the little mini street for a couple loops to get used to the different feel of the Toyota. Then mom decided it was time to try somewhere else, so she got back in the driver seat to take me somewhere else to drive.

The "somewhere else" was this little area with a paved road that was SUPPOSED to turn into a little housing area...but the houses were never built, so there's a random paved road that's really curvy and shit. Mom took me there to learn to control my turning. We went around and around, with a three-point turn in there at one point, until my mom turns to me and goes "SO, do you wanna drive us home?!"

I was immediately scared, because, HELLO, it's only my third day of driving! The way she was trying to make me take was going a small stretch down a road that was like a highway (not really a highway, but with as many cars and going as fast as one), down some residential roads, across another seriously busy street, then down a few more residential roads to our house. We argued for about ten minutes, with me still driving randomly around the little abandoned road, until she convinced me to drive home a longer but less scary route through a mostly residential area with a small stint on a really fast road (that she didn't warn me until I was turning onto it...thanks, mom) before turning into our neighborhood. I figured I'd have to get on the real roads eventually, and if I was this scared it might take a long time, so I said "fuck my fear" and jumped in.

We start down the road, only to find out the route she was going to take me was closed. So we have to drive randomly around a neighborhood before mom can find the one street in the neighborhood she knows and can direct me home from there. We finally find it after around 5 minutes, and I'm back on the way home. A minute or two later, we come up to my first ever stoplight, and the really busy road. The stoplight was green when I got up to it, so it was onto the road!

I've been terrified of other cars being on the road with me, because I feel like I'm not going fast enough for them and they'll get all road-ragey at me. So I'm going faster than I ever have so far, and freaking out. Another stoplight comes up, and I actually have to stop at this one. I manage that okay, and I turn into our neighborhood from there. We get to where I'm about to turn onto our street, and the bunch of kids that live on our street are all congregated RIGHT where I have to turn in. Mom directs me to turn on the turn signal and wait for them to move, and they do. Then creep, slowly, onto the street while they continue to move out of my way, and when they do, I go on down the street to our house.

I was also scared of parking in our driveway because I was convinced that I'd fuck it up. I turn into the drive, very slowly, and make it perfectly straight in one try.

I was exceedingly happy. I actually drove all the way home, without dying or crashing or both. I'm still not ready for highways or anything, but I think I can make small trips down your average roads now. Yay.

I promise I'll have a more interesting topic for Monday. I'm staying with a friend, FirePenguinDiscoPanda, at her house on Sunday through Monday night, and we are (at the moment, anyway) planning on having a spa day and watching movies and being awesome and not sleeping, and just generally hanging out. I'm really excited.

Okay, that's all for today.

See you next time,
Miss M