Failure: September, 2017

Things were going so well. Simone had already managed to drive us down the busy highway and along crowded surface streets, even picking her way through a hectic parking lot. She was finally getting it, and feeling more and more confident. Over the course of the last couple of months, the color of my knuckles had gone from icy white to a more human shade of pale.

We’d finished up at the snow sports equipment sale and had stopped in at Hmart, buying weird stuff we didn’t need because we’d made the mistake of getting there hungry. And we had another hour or so before Simone needed to be back at her mom’s house after a lovely Labor Day weekend. With our hearts set on Chinese food for lunch, Simone got behind the wheel again and made a smooth merge onto the highway.

We’ve had a long slog to get her moving on her journey toward a driver’s license. It took more than a year after Simone turned 16 to get her permit, and the 50 mandatory hours of driving are taking much longer than anticipated, with a 30-minute spin here and a 20-minute drive there. We’ve had a few hour-long jaunts, but haven’t been able to drive consistently together for longer periods of time.

She racked up only 18 hours of drive time between July of 2016 and September of this year. That’s slow progress.

I want to say that the problem has been limited opportunities for us to drive together, but it’s not at all the case. It’s more a matter of motivation. Simone doesn’t like to do things she’s not already good at, and she has no intrinsic need to be able to drive herself around. She doesn’t care that much about having a license. I’ll say, “Want to drive today?” and she’ll say, “Not really.” So unless I push her, it just doesn’t happen. It’s not fun for me, either, which makes me less likely to insist.

So we wedge in drive time here and there, when we’re both feeling up to it. But it’s not consistent.

When we exited the highway and turned left on the road, she easily stayed in her lane, and I was feeling pretty good about things. I noticed trash in the street up ahead — turned out to be a tissue box — and told her to avoid it. Neither of us noticed the car at the red light just ahead of us until it was too late.

“BRAKE! BRAKE! BRAKE!” I yelled, and to her credit, she slammed her foot down quickly. We skidded into the beat-up Volvo ahead of us hard enough to bash his bumper, but not enough for our airbags to go off, thank goodness.

“What do I do? What do I do?” Simone yelled, shaking, as the car ahead pulled through the intersection and parked on the side of the road. Calmly, I traded places with her, and drove our own car across the way.

Simone was a shaky, weepy mess, but I still made her get out of the car to assess the damage and meet the other driver. She stood there crying while I apologized (there was no question of fault) and started looking up the correct phone number to report the accident. After a few minutes, I let her go back to our car and sit down, afraid she would pass out right there on the sidewalk. It was important for her to see that the driver was okay, but also the extent of the damage, and for him to see the young student driver who’d made the mistake.

Once we’d settled things, and the other guy drove away, I walked back to the car and tried to calm Simone down. She wouldn’t have it.

“I never want to drive again,” she said.

I drove us the last few blocks to the Chinese restaurant (we were SO close!), and eventually coaxed Simone out of the car and inside. She said she wasn’t hungry, but I knew we both needed comfort food in our bellies and time to breathe. We ate our egg drop soup and beef with broccoli in relative silence, sipping at our hot tea. Nothing I said made it through her veil of shock and fear and disappointment in herself. We looked out at our sad vehicle, with the hood stove in, and she started crying again.

Later, when we got to her mom’s house, I stepped out of the car and gave her extra hugs before sending her along. But she was in her own fog, and all I could do was let her go, tears still wet on my shirt.

I made it all the way home before I let myself go, too. The stress of the day, the scare, and my apprehension of the consequences all caught up with me at once, and I curled up on the couch and lay there in a stupor, warm tears drifting down my cheeks. I looked up at the ceiling fan, slowly turning above me, and replayed the accident again and again in my mind, trying to figure out what I could have done differently. Should I have grabbed the wheel? Ignored the trash in the road? Looked ahead sooner? It didn’t matter, of course, because I couldn’t go back and fix it.

I felt like I’d failed as a parent.

My friends and family were full of silver lining reassurances — how it was good her first accident happened while I was with her, how many crashes they’d had in their first year of driving, how it wasn’t my fault. I heard them, but in the heat of my sadness, nothing really cut through the waves of disappointment.

I was suffering through one of those lonely moments when you just need someone to hug you and comfort you and handle things for a little while. Being a single dad means I’m always the caretaker, the voice of reason, the guy who fixes stuff, the problem solver. But that evening, I wished I had someone to take care of me for once. It could have been so much worse, but it was still awful, and all I could do was lay on the couch and wallow in my failure to keep her safe.

As parents, we try to always have the answers, and to be able to fix things for our kids when they go sideways. We strive to show them how to manage their own problems and take responsibility when they mess up, but it still breaks our hearts when it happens. I felt powerless that evening, like I’d failed my daughter.

But we can’t always fix it. We can’t always be there to help when they get into trouble. And part of good parenting is equipping our kids to handle the bad stuff on their own while letting them mess up so they can learn from their mistakes.

With Simone’s oncoming independence constantly on my mind, it’s hard to fight the desire to shield her just a little bit longer from everything she’ll have to face as a young adult. At the very least, you’d think I could help her not crash the car when we’re in it together.

I lost sight of the road because I was distracted by an innocuous obstacle, and missed the larger hazard. If I hadn’t mentioned the tissue box, maybe we both would have seen the red light sooner. But how many times have I missed the bigger picture because I was too caught up in something immediate, but not ultimately important? How can I teach Simone to keep her eyes on for short term situations while also looking at the larger context?

Driving, like life, is a constant push and pull of the immediate and the eventual. We learn to take in the many sensory inputs and make sense of them instantly — the weather, the traffic, the stop sign, the lady veering into our lane because she’s texting and driving. We learn to drive intuitively, knowing what’s a hazard and what’s a distraction, but we still make mistakes when we misapprehend the situation.

How do I help her understand that we all make mistakes, that we need to be vigilant but will still fuck up sometimes, and smash into the unsuspecting driver ahead of us? How do I teach her to forgive herself for messing up, when I’m beating the hell out of my own self for letting it happen?

Recounting stories from friends about their own mistakes as new drivers gives her perspective. But getting her to punch through her fear and hit the gas will be equally important.

The shock and intensity of the situation has passed, as these things do, of course. Simone still hasn’t driven again, but she says she’s about ready to…just not on the highway yet. We’ll take it slowly, and try to get that confidence back up.

Both hers, and mine.

Comments

[Richard Schuh]

16 ? How did this happen. I met Simone when she was 5 or 6. Just continue to be her rock Eric.

I always love your writing. You even made a car wreck interesting...

Lets have lunch sometime soon.

[Yulia Zhuk]

Wow so sorry this happened. I have been there had accidents and not wanted to drive again. I feel her pain. It’s just going to take a long time to process that life goes on and she can drive again. No one was seriously injured. If you need anything let me know.