A licensed driver

A few days into summer Darcy started a driver's education class. Because of her IB studies she is not able to take the class during the school year. Madison never got her permit in time to take the summer session each year, but Darcy had her permit as soon as she turned fifteen. She signed up for the class the first hour the class opened.

The program was held at another high school about twenty minutes away. She was in the class with two friends and arranged a car pool. There were over forty kids in the class and five cars. They drove in the parking lot around and around. "It is so boring," she told us. There were two instructors, one from our school and one from the school where the class was taught. One instructor was in charge of the parking lot driving and the other instructor would take out two students on the road. When students weren't driving they sat on the bleachers in the Florida sun and heat. It made for a very long day. Darcy would come home each day drenched in sweat and hop in the pool or in the shower. Then she would gripe about how "stupid" the class was and how she wasn't getting anything out of it.

The teacher, from the other school, would sit in the parking lot under an umbrella and read the newspaper. The students, three to a car, would drive and practice the day's maneuvers through the parking lot. The students on the bleachers would play cards, read, or talk. The stories she told made me shake my head because it seemed no one was paying attention to the students in the car. At one point while a student was driving she ran up the sidewalk and into a pole, "slowly" Darcy told us, and almost on to the tennis courts. The students all gasped, but the teacher reading the newspaper apparently never saw. His back was turned and so assessing there was no damage the student backed the car off of the sidewalk and continued on as if nothing had happened.

The class was twelve days, but if students passed in ten days then they were home free. Darcy had no trouble. She had practice with my friend SueG. She drove with us. She took the sheriff's defensive driving school. She drove circles around most of the kids when out on the road. Her instructor, from our school, was pretty impressed by her skills and she passed the day before we left for the United Kingdom. As soon as the class ended we were at the DMV.

God help me, but my daughter is a licensed driver.

I don't remember my parents or my neighbors being concerned about us kids driving. I remember the first time I drove by myself. I was way more frightened then my parents seemed to be. They let me take off in the car to go, I think, to the movies. I remember being really scared driving home in the dark. After that I only remember my mother being worried about my brother because his girlfriend (now his wife) lived way out in the country about thirty minutes away. I certainly know that she wasn't concerned about Madison driving as she kept pushing her to get her license. (She still doesn't have that.)

Today's driving is WAY worse then it was in my day. We have texting. We have phones. Our county doesn't even require classes! I'm a wreck every time Darcy leaves in the car. I didn't have to worry about it much because we left before she could drive by herself. The day after we got back she was hounding her day to get insurance and once that happened she was off. I insisted we sit down with her and have a conversation about rules. My husband was very nonchalant during the conversation and he and Darcy were doing way too much smiling and giggling as I talked. I started crying. "This is serious business," I told them. For heaven's sake, my husband did not let other adults drive Madison in a car until she was about seven years old. If friends invited her places, Tom drove her or accompanied her. I thought I was going to have way more back up about her driving.

We I told her she couldn't drive other kids until she had some experience under her belt. She heard one month. My SIL talked me into breaking that rule when they arrived because she was hoping that seeing Darcy driving would spur her daughter into taking her test. So Darcy and Gabby and Madison drove to play laser tag and drove to get Starbucks and drove to do anything that my SIL could talk me into. The girls reported back that Darcy was a good driver.

I'm trying to let go. I'm trying not to freak. Darcy meanwhile reminds me that she can drive to the store to get "whatever you need". She is being respectful of my concerns. I just hope that the other drivers are paying attention. I'm also hoping she isn't some day going to ask to take flying license so she can get her pilot's license.