Young drivers and their reputation
Young Drivers And Their Reputation
Young drivers have earned themselves a pretty awful reputation which has dubbed them as being “bad drivers”. However, how much of this is true? Contrary to popular belief, there are only a few bad drivers in the younger age groups. Naturally, when your hormones are raging and you’re trying to show off to your new girlfriend or even your guy friends, you might make a stupid decision or two that could wind up getting you into trouble. However, for the most part, those who have just earned their licenses to drive are actually more careful and cautious when they first start out.
When I first learned how to drive, I was excited to skip the bus in the morning and drive myself to school. In retrospect, driving myself to school didn’t really mean much because I still had to get up at the same time every morning; and despite the fact that my brother would hop on the bus to go to school, I had to leave shortly after the bus came to get him in order to get to school on time. In most instances, I would actually see our bus and find myself following it or winding up just in front of it, both of us pulling into the parking lot at the same time. It was a little annoying to say the least.
The thrill of being able to be in the car by yourself though was more than worth it to me. To not have to share a bus with a bunch of noisy, rowdy kids (actually, our bus was relatively quiet in the morning); to be able to have the space and privacy to blast whatever music I wanted, it was pure bliss. I was always responsible when I first started out driving, obeying the posted speed limits and anxious for any opportunity to show off my awesome parallel parking skills. However, there was a time period in which all of that changed. Admittedly, I went through a bit of a rebellious stage during my senior year of high school where I suddenly found myself flooring it just to get out of the driveway. I was testing both my skills as a driver as well as my parents’ patience to say the least. I often didn’t follow the speed limit, and earned the nickname ‘lead foot’ from my disapproving father.
It wasn’t until more recently, when I actually started paying for things myself after getting out of college and getting a ‘real job’ that I slowed down. I slowed down not because I had necessarily learned to embrace the laws of the road, but rather, I slowed down because it was costing far too much money to fill up at the gas station sometimes twice a week. Young drivers are not necessarily dangerous per se. It seems that some of us just take a little longer to mature.