Letter: Be patient with student drivers
In New Hampshire, when teenagers turn 15½, they can start driving with their parents. They are required to log many hours behind the wheel, and most take driver’s education. The first few trips are usually in an empty parking lot, followed by seldom-traveled rural roads and eventually onto city streets and highways.
All licensed drivers would do well to remember how scary it was when they started and to be patient with young drivers.
I was recently at Petco with my 16-year-old, who is taking driver’s ed. She has been driving with me for more than six months, and I asked if she wanted to drive home. Apparently, she did not exit her space quickly enough as a big SUV honked at her to hurry up. She stopped at the stop sign by Uno’s and was almost run down by the same SUV.
When she stopped to exit the parking lot onto Fort Eddy Road, she was honked at again because she was taking too long to merge into traffic. If that wasn’t rude and unsettling enough, the driver of the SUV tore around our car and screamed “learn how to f---ing drive!”
This was the same family that moments before we had chatted with in line at Petco. The woman’s two young children were in the car to witness her behavior.
Needless to say, it was a very quiet, very slow ride home in my car after that.
I hardly think that the extra 20 seconds that this family was stuck behind our vehicle warranted the type of reaction that would traumatize a student driver. Please be patient. Remember how it felt when you started driving. We could stand to extend a little more courtesy to one another.
DEBORAH CMAR
Bow
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