And He Taught Me To Drive…

Learning to drive all over again, feels so much like going back home in time…

to when I was much younger, to the time when my father gave me the handle of the Royal Enfield Bullet, on a straight road sans disturbances, with darkness upon us and the constant whimpering of my mother with my still young sister in her arms, terrified and saying in a little voice that I was too young to do what I was doing…

And I remember my father say through the corner of his mouth, without looking back, checking the road ahead for his young driver son, “I wouldn’t give him control if I didn’t trust him. If there is trouble, I will take over…” and my mother calmed down. I knew that day that even at seven, one could feel ten feet tall.

Eons later, when the Enfield disappeared and four wheels made their appearance for the first time in our lives, it was my father again who made me take the wheel. (Though I fell in love with our bright red Maruti Van at first sight, I had to wait till my eighteenth birthday to graduate from the left side of the Van to the right). Endless slaps on the wrist in a quest to gain steering balance later, my father felt confident enough to agree that the Van had become an extension of my mind and body. And he left me loose, to live life with the car, my own way.

Again, he trusted me enough to permit me to use the car as I wanted to. The trust was always there that I wouldn’t do anything that he wouldn’t with his car.

Years later, when I am on the fringes of getting my own car, trying for a drivers license whose primary concern is that I graduate from the RIGHT back to the LEFT, I miss my father. I miss the days when he sat by my side, never showing the fear he felt, slapping away at each tiny mistake and praising each moment of wise driving.

I started Qatar’s driving classes on the 10th of this month. I believe there is no better time to acknowledge the best driving teacher in the world.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the award goes to my dad, patience personified, for being the best in the trade when it comes to training his first born, in that delightful indulgence known simply as driving…