You think you are behind, but you are right where you want to be. This is the thought I had today as I was recalling conversations I had with a friend of mine who used to be one of my neighbors at an old apartment complex. It was my first apartment ever, and after a year of being there, he moved next door, and we used to talk about all kinds of life experiences on our shared balcony, which was also the walkway for everyone on the second floor.
I recall the insecurities I used to battle at that time because I was a single parent at the time of a young child and didn’t have the best upbringing myself. One parent got sick when I was really young, and I had to step up at times when the other parent went back to school to take over the household finances on top of everything else.
My parents were of the Silent Generation and, long story short, weren’t the best parents and didn’t really know how to parent, so many of us ended up in the wrong crowds and had to figure out life for ourselves. Which also meant none of us got along, and there were unthinkable actions in the home due to a lack of accountability, denial, and undiagnosed mental illnesses. Drugs and drinking also factored into the home.
Now, as adults, none of us talk to one another except maybe one sibling. I talk to one. Another talks to a different one, and others talk to none. The last time I saw all of us in the same room was at the last parent’s funeral.
So, after all of that, and becoming a young parent from my own childhood, I found myself struggling with everything except the love I had for my own and what I wanted for him. When I had turned 16, I was never taught to drive. It wasn’t even a conversation. It was never brought up. Some of my siblings learned to drive by stealing cars, whether it was our parents’ or someone else’s.
So not knowing how to drive or owning a car was a huge insecurity of mine until my late 20s when I finally realized it wasn’t what I wanted at all. Now in my 30s, I am happy not to own a car because I live in a downtown area, don’t have to pay for parking, gas, insurance, and all else that comes with owning a car. I have managed to invest the difference.
When I was in college the first time around in my early 20s, two college friends of mine taught me how to drive. Well, the first one just got me behind the wheel and told me to drive, but he wasn’t a great teacher.
First, he wasn’t from here, and second, there was a time when I meant to push the brake but accidentally hit the gas, scaring a lady who was getting something out of her van while he was trying to direct me. He wasn’t very patient, and I had on thick-soled shoes. It was a mess. Needless to say, I never got back into the driver’s seat of his car again, and that was in the parking lot across from our campus
The second time, a friend had me drive off from campus all the way across town, but was patient with all that I was doing. It was planned so I knew to wear shoes where I could feel the pedals.
When I pulled out from a street but stopped into the intersection because the light quickly turned red, he told me that next time just to keep going, that we don’t stop halfway, but that it was fine, people will just go around.
When I started to get overwhelmed with anxiety, he allowed me to pull over, catch my breath, and keep going. I kept asking if I was in someone else’s lane, and he told me that I wasn’t and that, in fact, others were often in my lane. I kept worrying I was in the wrong. (Childhood trauma will do that a person.)
But at the end, he called me a natural and just told me I was in my own head with anxiety, that I would have no trouble getting my license. He told me once again that driving is freedom just as he did when he found out I had never driven before.
I agree that it does offer a bit more freedom in the sense of not having to wait for a bus or getting somewhere faster. However, this is where I no longer feel it is that kind of freedom most people assume. I can’t tell you how many people panic without a car, even when public transportation is more than decent in their town, or how many think it is the golden ticket to adulthood, when there are plenty of golden tickets out there in the pursuit of becoming an adult—such as, perhaps, being financially responsible and not getting into loads of debt with vehicles and high car payments.
Now, as I sit here thinking back on those times when not having a driver’s license bothered me — how I used to listen to my neighbor at the time talk about his 16-year-old learning to drive, how he bought him a car, and the moment his son smirked when his dad showed it off, further making me feel a certain way about my own teen years— I can’t help but realize how much I had it wrong.
How building my life up to where it is now actually makes getting a license second fiddle and that is being generous. I do, however, have my passport, which makes me happier, as the most freedom people driving with licenses will ever get is around their towns or within the same country if they are road travelers.
I can always go and get my license and own a car, but when I do, I won’t be under the impression that having a car or a car to show off is the most important thing next to adulthood.
Which leads me back to saying that sometimes you think you are behind, but you are right where you want to be, and it takes time to realize that. Now, for my own teen, I told him I would pay for driving lessons when he is ready, but I won’t buy him a car.
Instead, I started a portfolio for him when he was 13 and taught him how to fish—meaning how to invest and be financially responsible. If and when he wants to own a car, he will be able to do so when he is ready and has the means to do so without taking on obscene amounts of god awful debt.
P.S. Some of the most well-off people I know don’t own cars in their cities. New Yorkers, in particular, are known for not having driver’s licenses due to the subway system and congested streets. Former Mayor Michael Bloomberg has been known to take the subway, which is also notorious for celebrity sightings.
There is also this contraption called a bicycle. One of my favorite modes of getting around, well, was, until I walked out of the library one evening years ago after studying to find my chain and helmet tossed on the ground and the bike gone. But, that is a story for another time.
The Broke College Student 
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