Wednesday, March 11, 2015

My Daughter Will be Driving

My eldest daughter turned fifteen on me a few months ago. That means we're in the downhill slide into getting a license. It's no longer this "when she grows up" thing. In fact, she goes to the driver's ed part of things here in just a couple of weeks.

http://www.gettingorganizedtoday.com/dreamstime_LittleGirlDriving.jpg
That's not her in the picture, but that's very much how it looks in my head when I imagine it. In reality, she's 5'9", that kind of fifteen-year-old who looks seventeen--so grown up and gorgeous that it's amazing to think that such a creature sprung from my loins. But, she is and always will be my little girl, too.

Like every parent who ever arrived at this moment (I suspect), I am both excited and terrified by the prospect of my girl behind the wheel. It's another one of those big moments, like when she learned to walk, or lost a baby tooth, or took off her training wheels, or performed her first solo, or got her braces off, or fell in love. In every one of these moments, I've reacted the same way. Part of me has wanted to cry and cling to the younger version of her and rail against the heavens for letting her grow up too fast. Part of me is proud of her, and anxious to see what this next phase of life brings us.

I know I'm lucky in that my daughter is an intelligent and capable young woman, with common sense and a good sense of self-preservation. I teach middle school, so I know a lot of teenagers. Some of them are complete flibberty-gibbets and I worry about them riding bicycles, let alone operating vehicles with engines. My girl is not one of those. She'll handle it well.

The question is, will I?

8 comments:

  1. Congrats on using the word flibbertygibbit in your post. As for learning to drive, it is a rite of passage for you both. I was actually relieved when my daughter got her license. I was tired of schlepping her around.

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    1. Yes, it will be nice to have another driver in the family, logistically speaking. I'll try to focus on that.

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  2. My daughter is fifteen. Will turn 16 in July. I went through the same apprehension with my son. But it is a necessary skill and a right of passage. We teach them the best we can and let go.
    Life & Faith in Caneyhead

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    1. I totally agree that it's necessary, but isn't it strange how something you had fifteen years notice about can still sneak up on you?

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  3. We wish to teach them to drive responsibly, but they are so young that they cannot possibly comprehend how terrifying the driving rules are. And we cannot comprehend that they just might okay.

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    1. I know she's a capable young woman. It's the other drivers I worry about!

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  4. I don't have children so I can't outright sympathize but my mom had the hardest time with my husband and I moving out when we were 23. I thought it was beyond time... I was married! She cried a lot. In fact, after we stay for a visit, it bothers her that we leave. I'm the only one of her kids moved out, that may have something to do with it.

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    1. Mothering is hard. It's strange in that, if you're doing it right, they lose their dependence on you and learn to stand alone.

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