March 2nd was Alex's Magic Day--the day he was old enough to take the test to get his learner's permit. I've tortured him for weeks with it, never saying whether we were going to allow him to take the test or not. He asked, but the answer was always, "We'll see." There was no needed explanation for "we'll see" because he knows well what it means. We'll see about grades, behavior, cooperation, attitude, and how good the bribes are.
We had no intention of not allowing him to take the test, but I also know better than to promise anything. If he'd shown up with another tattoo, there would be no permit. Slacked off on his share of the kids' chores, no permit. There were a lot of things that could get in between him and that trip to the DMV, and I wasn't saying yes or no until the evening of March 1st. There was only one incident lately that had "no" on the tip of my tongue, one that only would have delayed it a day or two, when he exploded at Kevin for being in his room. Kids yell at each other, sure, but that doesn't mean we allow it as a matter of course. But, when Char pointed out that Alex had asked him nicely to stay out of his room because he had math homework papers all over the place and he really didn't want anything scattered, but Kevin went in anyway and moved a critical paper, I could hardly hold that against him.
Wednesday morning before his first class I took him to take the test; we waited an hour before he could take it, it only took him 10 minutes to take the actual test, and it was another 30 minutes of bullshit waiting until he had her permit in hand.
And then I was a total dick and would not let him drive to school.
After I picked him up in the afternoon I took him to the old dojang and let him drive around the parking lot at about 15 mph, and he practiced braking, backing up, and parking, and it was enough to make him happy. I'll take him back tomorrow, but I'm not letting him onto a street until he's started driver's ed, which begins Monday.
Char refuses to be the parent responsible for teaching him to drive. She doesn't want to be in the car until I'm sure he's a good driver; it's less a fear of what might go wrong and that he's going to wreck than it is a fear that she's going to shriek and scare him at the wrong moment. This is fine; my mother wouldn't ride with me for a long time, either. I was taught to drive by my dad, who wasn't driving at all at the time.
I am resigned to not driving for the next six months, at least when it's just the two of us in the car. I don't think he'll be practicing with the other kids in the car yet.
I have no real worries about how good a driver he'll be. I worry about the fact that when he gets his license he'll have a 16 year old's brain in his head, and with that comes questionable judgment. I worry that he'll be 16, with his own car, a girlfriend, and will no longer be chauffeured around on dates. That combined with the 16 year old brain, it gives me pause.
For now, though, I'm going to try to enjoy the process of watching him grow a little. I haven't forgotten what a big deal getting my license was and how it felt the first time I took the car out on my own. I never would have guessed that my parents were probably nervous wrecks about it, and I hope he doesn't realize it, either.
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