Hand me down knowledge

Tammy and I had a nice relaxing weekend. Last week was wildly busy and this week portends to be the same so we took this weekend and hibernated.

Several of my friends are getting (or have gotten) their first drivers license recently. Yes, these are 16 year old-ish "peeps", and yes I call them friends because that's what they are. I've gotten to know them over the last year or two through church. Granted there's a generation gap that keeps me from knowing when I'm suppose to put "izzle" on the ends of words and they aren't likely to want to spend a bunch of time talking about that awesome Merlot I found for $7.99. They will occasionally risk their reputations by giving me a lame old guy fist bump for which I'm quite honored. We don't blow it up after though, I don't want to get them completely ostracized by their peers.

Getting your license is huge. I still remember that sense of freedom that came with getting behind the wheel of the car that first time. Talking, well ok mostly teasing, my friends about getting their license made me think about teaching my daughter Alia to drive. I'm not what you'd call the most patient person. Anyone who has worked with me to accomplish any task from cleaning house to implementing a recursive API knows that sitting back and pondering the esthetic nuances of how I approach the task isn't something I do. I think if you asked her Alia would answer that I was a different person sitting next to her in the car. I've always been hard on her, but I may have earned a fist bump for the driving lessons.

All this got me thinking about what influence my parents had on me learning to drive. My mom taught me all kinds of things. She taught me to cook and how to persevere. She wasn't about to try and teach me to drive though. My father wasn't around when I got my license but he did at one point give me some driving tips. I guess I was probably 8 years old when he explained how useful the new bumps on the edge of the road were. They had just lined several streets in his area with bumps on the edge of the roadway designed to give an audible warning as you crossed onto the shoulder. My dad told me "When you've had too much to drink, you can put your tires on those bumps and it helps you to stay on the road. If you don't hear the thrum thrum, you stop the car." Ahh, wisdom that drains down like the stream in sports stadium trough urinal.

Dad was a two case a beer a day drunk. I can tell a mess of stories of being in the 63 Comet he had, no seatbelt, bouncing around as he drained the Heidelberg and Rainier. When we'd take long trips, like the infamous Independence Day trip to Caldwell Idaho, he'd take advantage of the wonderful park like settings of the Rest Areas to lay out a blanket and sleep it off. Yup, we were living the dream. Things got worse to the point that my parents divorced and I didn't see my Dad much until I was in my 20's. He got sober, remarried, and started a new family. He didn't seem to remember much of those times. At one point he bought his dream car, some sort of Ford Mustang, and had rolled it over on SR99. The car was destroyed and he woke up. He was sober the last 9 years of his life.

All too frequently as we drive down Key Peninsula Highway we get behind a drunk driver. It baffles me that at this point with all the statistics and education that I still see these folks, in the oncoming lane of travel on moment, and nearly in the ditch the next. Our police have a whole infrastructure underfunded just to manage drunk drivers. I understand addiction, I do. I get the desire to escape. I've had times in my life that I've crawled into my own forms of self delusion to pretend that pain wasn't there. That behavior that causes people to run in panic from life nullified my relationship with my father and played a significant part in the loss of my brother Lyle.

But what clicks in the inebriated brain that says, "Wow, I'm on my lips! Let's go for drive"? I know you think you can explain it to me. Lots of folks have tried. I'll still look at you and scratch my head. But here's an even more important question, what do we have to do to stop them? When I worked for the Patrol we would frequently hear stories from Troopers about drunks they had bagged who had been convicted 5 or 6 times! Maybe it's gotten better, but my guess is that it hasn't. Perhaps one of my friends that still work there will read this and chime in.

I went to Bing and searched on Washington State drunk driving laws, and out of the first page of results all but one were some kind of advertisement for attorneys who specialize in DUI defense so I'm betting the practice is alive and well.

I bet you are thinking I'm about to make an appeal for my own solution to this problem. Well, I'm not. Here's what I am going to say. It should be no surprise to anyone that our roads are filled nightly with some percentage of pickled drivers. It probably isn't a shocker when I say that we see a fair number of them on KPH. I will make this plea though. KPH is a dark 2 lane road with no shoulder in most places. Why is it that I see people walking down this thing wearing black jeans, black t-shirts and black jackets? Even worse, why are many of these pedestrians kids?

In truth I don't see a sustainable answer to these problems on the horizon. I think there are answers to be had; I just don't think we seem to be able muster up the collective will to solve them. Drunk driving was one of the earliest "hot button" topics I can remember. The moment a problem reaches that profile level all hope of solving them seems to dissipate. Too many people see opportunity in misery. They begin to use it as a platform to get elected to public office, write books, and start support groups. Can you imagine a lawyer who makes his money defending drivers charged with DUI becoming an advocate of a long term solution to drinking and driving?

The same story gets told over and over again. Terrorism, health care, pollution, you name it.

Perhaps I just lack vision. Where some people look at suffering and pain and see "book deal" I just see suffering and pain. I guess I need to learn to look on the bright side.

Don't drive angry! Drive weird!