Legal driver

This last Tuesday I passed my driving test. I am now a fully licensed driver, which I find somehow amusing. Getting a license feels like something you should have to put a lot of work in to; it feels as though practising by just going out and driving for a bit shouldn’t be enough to let you pass, yet somehow it is. But I’ve enjoyed the bits of driving that I have done, and I’m looking forward to one day having a car of my own. And until then I will get my kicks out of driving my friends’ cars

The driver’s test was stressful. The only thing that I sometimes struggle with when driving is reverse parking / alley docking. I did some practise parking before my test, where I did the alley docking perfectly: I turned the car at the correct time, straightened out fine and neatly reversed into the bay. Then came the yard portion of my driver’s test. Everything here went well except for the alley docking. Every time I straightened out of the turn the car was either too far to the left or to the right of the bay. But I managed to wiggle the car into the bay without hitting any of the poles (which would be an immediate fail), a feat which made me very happy at the time.

And now the whole testing affair is over! Now I get to enjoy the act of driving without worrying about whether I’ll make it through some test or not. Yippee!

Of driving, umbrellas, and running

Today was one of those days when you do a number of different things for the first time. One first: I got behind the wheel of a car and drove on the road. That was exciting and stressful. I was out at Greenpoint with a driving instructor, on some small, residential roads, in a car which seemt expensive and like something I didn’t want to ding too much. But it went OK, even though when I got behind the wheel everything I’d been trying to remember about the clutch, K-53, and how sensitive the pedals were, kept on fading from memory. But I managed to pull out and do some really slow driving. And all this without any unwanted dings and pedestrian fatalities.

Another first: a cop (not a traffic officer, but a real police officer) asked to see my license. Talk about combing stressors: first time on the road, first time asked for a license by the Law. I wasn’t even doing anything illegal, I was just stopped at a stop street.

Another first: I ran across UCT campus today. Just like being stopped by the cops, this isn’t a first that I wanted to do, but it did stop an umbrella of mine from dissapearing in the nasty clutches of some undergrad. I’d just got off one of the UCT shuttles only to realise that I’d forgotten my umbrella onboard. By now the shuttle was already driving away along ring road. I’d already lost it once already this year (thanks Simon for finding it!), so I ran after it – cutting across campus to run up the stairs (and hill) behind the food court to reach the West Side shuttle stop.

Only the shuttle had already moved on – I hoped only to the next stop, but I was worried it and my umbrella were already on their way to town.

I’d already run half the length of campus, and now I ran the remaining half. I was really relieved that from there on it was all down hill. And yes, the shuttle was still at the South Side stop, and I found my umbrella being kept warm for me in the arms of an undergrad. I was probably a disturbing site: out of breath, slightly sweaty, and really short on words. But I was damn happy to get that umbrella back.

And I really don’t want to do that run again.