Driving for Distance

A co-conspirator in enjoying life and laughing as often as possible send me an interesting email. Rob T sent a story about a man who owned the same car for 82 years. He received a graduation present from his dad in 1928 in the form of a Rolls Royce. He drove it until he died in 2010 and it had over a million miles on it. The article said it still ran great.

At this time my mother-in-law is getting ready to sell her last car, a 1995 Accord with about 38,000 miles on it. It still runs well...the car I mean. Well, the 92 year old mom-in-law runs well too but she knows her driving days are over. I applaud the fact that she sees this and has made this decision on her own without showdowns with family or insurance or police. It can't be easy, but she's doing it. Kudos to Nettie.

When my time comes to quit driving I will probably whine, gripe, and be a nuisance to the kids and police officers who followed me home after having hit three cars in the Wal Mart parking lot where I'll be working at age 88. In other words, I'll just be myself as they pry the keys out of my hand. Wait, by then it will be a computer chip in my arm used to start the car... I guess they will deactivate the chip. Oh well... But rather than think about that "end play" I choose to look back a moment to the beginning of my driving--auto driving anyway. I learned to drive a tractor before the pick-up or car, not much before thanks to Pop. My grandfather started letting me drive his Chevy pickup around the pasture and fields at about 11 or 12 years. He even let me drive on the gravel road from one farm back to the house way before I was "legal" to drive.  His Chevy pickup and the red, 1963 Ford Dad had was a three speed on the column. Pop's old pickup even had the starter on the floor as did my other granddad's pickup. Starting, clutching, shifting without grinding and downshifting to slow or enter a field or driveway taught coordination to the kid and patience to the elder. Let's don't even mention the choke knob. You had to be fully engaged to operate the machine. It's no wonder the cell phone wasn't invented until much later, no one had an extra hand to operate anything but the vehicle in the 50's and 60's. I still remember the fear, the thrill, the excitement, the wonder when Pop got in the passenger door of the pickup when we were out in his pasture and said "you drive a while."

I didn't know it then, I couldn't then,  but I crossed a line. A rite of passage was taking place on a cow-rut road in a remote pasture. A part of being a little kid was being left behind and I was moving on. Responsibility, work, dates, fun, expense, repair, travel, adventure and a dozen other things moved onto the near horizon of my life that day. I'd take a '68 Mercury Montclair to college and on my honeymoon. It was the size of small aircraft carrier. I'd buy a new '76 Volvo with college money not spent because of athletic scholarships (and a little help from Dad) and carry my children home from the hospital and take my family to far flung places like Big Spring and Bronte in that puke green machine.

One day soon we won't be driving our cars, they will drive us. And one day soon after that, to the degree that control over your vehicle is still in a human's hand, an official will deactivate my computer chip and I won't be allowed behind the wheel anymore. That is sad. But I take solace and am even thrilled a bit to know that my Heavenly Father owns the cattle on a thousand hills. And in His Kingdom there will always be new cow-rut roads awaiting one of His children coming of age, ready to take on an new adventure. I will fear, thrill, and enjoy the excitement and wonder as time and again in His eternity He speaks to me and says: "you drive a while." And it will be considerably longer than 82 years.

Still chugging,
Cos