When I was 16 and driving, my parents were waiting for the day that they would get the phone call that I was dead or had killed someone because I was such a jackhole driver.

The only call they got was when I flipped a minivan with my car pulling out of a gas station and not paying attention to the oncoming traffic to my left.

I think the relative price of driving is part of the reason for the differences, too. Cars are pretty expensive here, but insurance is even moreso, especially if you're under 25. I know one 19 year old boy who paid two and a half thousand euro to insure his one thousand euro car. Petrol prices make a difference too. The boy was pretty shocked at the price of petrol here when we rented a car a few weeks ago.

I don't think that the necessity of having to drive, often sooner rather than later, due to the lack of consistant public transportation and the low priority to provide same in most of the US is eye-rolly; just the whole car thing in our culture. It's a tool. It gets me from Point A to Point B. It is not an extention of my personality, a validation of my financial sucess, or a valid excuse to authorize my government to support my driving cheaply by any and all means.

When in Europe, the thing I loved the most was not needing a car to get to practically anywhere on the continent. I came home determined I would never own a car. I did, of course, end up needing to own several, and the stress and anxiety it caused in me was legion. I'm profoundly grateful and lucky that I don't need a car to get to work or to do many of my daily necessary errands, I can walk easily or take public transportation. But still, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't relieved we have the old crappy reliable Escort to go to Target, grocery shopping, the farm, visit my parents, etc.

Anyway.

I was 11 when my granddaddy taught me to drive a tractor and a truck. I promptly dented his truck while driving too fast down a little country path to the Back 40. I don't think I was allowed to drive again until I was 14.

This reminds me, when I was driving up to ABQ with the family last week, my brother regaled us with tales of the death defying stupid shit he did in high school (some of which I already knew, some not.) Involved cars a lot. Later, mom said she knew he'd been an idiot then, but how in the hell had he survived?!!

I had to laugh. What she doesn't know (still) is some of the stupid shit he pulled even after that, while in the Army. With guns and things that go boom and fast cars and nitrogen boosters and ...

He's much more sane or, I guess, more mindful of the mortality thing (when he races his car now , it's after practicing with a professional driver at a licensed track with safety equiptment and EMTs and fire extinguishers and other professional drivers, not highway 82 at 4 am with no headlights and a bunch of inebriated punks driving daddy's dream car or a junker with a monster for an engine.)

Huh. I was 11 when my dad had me drive the pickup to the Back 40. The truck had an automatic and a fast idle, so I was a little freaked out by it going 25 mph without me touching the gas. I did OK, except I parked it on a hill and left it in neutral. (Luckilly, it didn't roll anywhere.)

First car I drove was my cousin's soon-to-be-MIL's station wagon out on farm roads. I was 10?11? I still think my cousin was insane, but really, corn wasn't even high enough for us to have damaged the car if we couldn't manage to drive straight.

My problem was I had gotten used to the speed of the truck (over, say, a bicycle or 3-wheeler), but wasn't aware enough of spatial differences to realize that I couldn't bank around a particular tree with crunching into the one on the other side. I'll never forget that sound.

My dad let me steer the car a few times (I leaned over from the front passenger seat while he took care of the pedals) when I was in junior high, and my sister took me out for my first car driving lesson when I was 15, down country roads that were still only gravel-paved, but are now double-laned and surrounded by subdivisions.

I also remember the time we were done with our swimming lessons at the local motel (indoor pool with annual fees for the local residents and lessons offered made a great YMCA alternative in the years before the Y finally opened a branch nearby), and the parking lot was a bit slick and very empty, so Dad did a few donuts. We kids were shrieking in delight, and Mom was yelling, "Karl, for God's sake, stop it!"

I thought I bookmarked this discussion, but apparently not. Can anyone remind me how to put a Netflix account on hold?