Patience, and why it's a virtue (Driving Courses in general)

Member Name: The_Cat

Product:	Driving Courses in general
Date:	05/06/03 (212 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Increased mobility, more freedom (sounds cliched, but it's true)

Disadvantages: Holy overdrafts, Batman!, can be scary at first

Cars. Though they provide a level of drama and intrigue that’s perhaps a touch lower than I’d like for an opening sentence, they are the great love of my short life. As a petrolhead from the age of 5, I was naturally keen to take driving lessons upon turning 17 last July (in reality, it took me until February to find the money for it) so I could benefit from the freedom and mobility only a car can provide, and have a whale of a time while I was at it. Hopefully, this op can point out a few things that prospective learners should be aware of before they take the plunge, and show just how many times I’ve nearly killed myself in the name of investigative journalism.

Though I’m not keen on splitting my ops into sections – I prefer them to be more fluid, to have everything flow into the next sentence, and to sound arty and pretentious while I’m explaining my writing style – it’s probably the best way to deal with learning to drive, so here goes…

Before you start…

Something every learner should be aware of is cost – learning to drive is not cheap, and it’s up to the individual to decide whether or not it’s worth marrying a wealthy African prince to bankroll it all. My lessons cost £12 a go, and this is the cheapest instructor I could find. Depending on who you book with and where you are, you could find instructors asking for closer to £20 a lesson. Don’t just book with the first instructor you find – shop around for the best deals.

Don’t forget the added extras – the theory test will set you back the frankly peculiar sum of £15.50, plus whatever it costs you to get to your nearest theory test centre – in my case, £3.20 on buses to Middlesbrough and back. I haven’t even asked about the practical test yet, for reasons that will become clear later, but that will take another hefty bite out of my wallet. Once you pass,
of c
ourse, there’s the cost of buying and maintaining a car to consider, as well as insurance costs somewhere up into the stratosphere for new drivers. Before you can even learn, there’s a provisional licence to pay for, and once you’ve learned, there’s a full licence to pay for. Then of course there’s the road tax, the ever-more-costly petrol, congestion charges and tolls if you’re really unlucky…

It helps to find an instructor you like. Friends of mine have been put off driving by their choice of driving school – they didn’t like the person trying to teach them, so they couldn’t enjoy driving the car, so they stopped altogether. To get around this, you could always try an instructor who doesn’t do block bookings – that way you can head somewhere else straight away if you aren’t keen.

The driving part

So, you’ve picked an instructor, remortgaged your house, got your provisional licence (complete with the standard “seeing is believing” photo) and now you’re ready to go. As a general set of guidelines, remember the following:

1) Nervousness is natural when you first get behind the wheel. A heartbeat that sounds like the bass line from the last Red Hot Chili Peppers single, however, is not.

2) Do not take it as a sign of religious enlightenment if your instructor takes to quoting from the Bible every 50 yards and openly prays before every lesson.

3) Shouting various expletives at the top of your voice will not make your car stop any faster/that bollard disappear/your instructor happy.

Once you get the hang of things, it isn’t desperately difficult to drive a car. In the same way, it isn’t too hard to walk once you get the hang of things (at least under normal circumstances, though there’s a very amusing alcohol-related story that ends with me having to ascend a staircase on
all fours
before taking a doner kebab to bed with me), but how long did it take you to even make your first, faltering steps as a baby? To start with, every movement I made felt awkward – I pushed the brake pedal too hard, was too hesitant with the accelerator, and I’d rather not comment on my gear changes except to say that the gearbox was a bit stiff and the crunching noise became quite soothing after a while. If, like me, you tended to come bottom of the class in woodwork and your textiles project just had to be seen to be truly understood, you might struggle initially. If, like me, you have the hand-eye co-ordination of plankton, mastering even the basics of driving will take an effort.

It’s enough getting to grips with this in a deserted trading estate or car park, but dealing with other traffic at the same time is where the fun really starts. Many of Hartlepool’s motorists, be they the driver of the white van I almost nerfed in a one-way street, the Vauxhall Astra driver I unwittingly brake-tested in the town centre when confronted by a stray twig, or the painter who stalked me for 20 minutes after a slight misunderstanding on a roundabout, will tell you that this wasn’t something I initially took to. It’s terrifying for a start – bumbling along at 20 mph being overtaken at close quarters is no fun, and nor is the feeling you’re going to clout someone when you finally get up to speed. Once you settle in it’s fine, and as with everything practice makes perfect, but this is the area that’ll scare off a good many learners.

Given time and an instructor blessed with an impressive degree of patience, things have improved. For a start, my knuckles no longer turn white when I’m driving, and I can straighten my fingers after a lesson for the first time. From a frankly abysmal beginning, I’ve progressed to a level where I have completed most of the manoeuvres I ca
n be tested on
and feel completely at ease behind the wheel.


The key thing to remember when driving is that we all make mistakes. Everyone stalls a car occasionally, or makes a ‘kangaroo juice’ getaway, or misses the odd gearshift here and there. The point of taking lessons is to make sure you stop making them before you’re let loose on your own, so don’t get disheartened if things don’t seem to be going well for you. The sheer prohibitive cost of it all means that you should be sure you want to drive or need to drive before you get going, and there is a lot to get to grips with, but for those who master it, a lifetime of increased freedom and pure driving pleasure awaits – especially if you’re sharing a home with that African royalty.

Cheers,
Simo

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