Driving with Girls

My sister Bethany is learning to drive and because I'm the only person she knows who has an automatic--I'm the lucky girl who is teaching her!

Teaching someone to drive is the scariest thing in the world. Scarier than predatory birds. Scarier than clowns. Scarier than evil toddlers.

She studied long and hard before we got behind the wheel and is sufficiently humbled by the task, but she has sooo little experience driving.  The other thing that scares me is that I'm responsible to make sure that she is a good driver once she gets her license. I don't want to forget to teach her anything!

We started off driving around Rose Park. We drove around the neighborhood, parking lots, and practiced three point turns. The next trip--I took her out at night and we want on bigger highways and practiced left hand turns at lights. We drove up 300 West, around the Capitol, past the temple and back to her apartment.

The next trip we drove from 600 North and Redwood Road down to 4500 south and over to State Street and back up State Street. It was 1pm, so traffic wasn't too bad, but it was still pretty busy.

We practiced changing lanes and she did a great job turning left on some pretty scary roads. I didn't drive on anything that complicated until later in my driving, but the girl lives in downtown SLC, so she's gotta get used to the busy roads.

The next trip--we drove on... THE FREEWAY! We went down to the Kmart on 90th South. She was great! I thought I would die. It was so scary. But we made it! And she did a great job! Then we drove back! And she did that too! Wahoo!

Tonight was all about learning to navigate. We drove to the airport--through the airport, and then went west almost to Tooele. I thought it would be good freeway time, but also I wanted her to learn to follow the signs at the airport, etc. By the time we got to the exit for Tooele, my nerves had had it. She's a great driver, but she forgets to keep her foot on the gas. And I was scared. So I drove home. I figured a trip through the airport and out west was enough for one day.

This Christmas, I don't have money for gifts. But I'm trying to give the gift of my time. I'm trying to give words and gifts that are reminiscent of the kinds of gifts Heavenly Father gives to me. Hope, inspiration, love. I'm really not cheap, but I want to focus on giving meaningful experiences and memories. These driving lessons have been a wonderful opportunity to give my little sister a useful life skill and I get to spend time getting to know the sister I barely knew until last year. It's been a real gift for me.