Be Knowledgeable And Aware

Around the age of 9, my mother picked me up like always, and oddly she was noticeably quiet, I didn’t pay any mind to it as I was too young to be socially aware but then she broke the news to me that my twenty-two cousin who was basically an older brother to me passed away in a car crash. I was in utter shock, my memories of him relapsing in my mind to the point of how I would’ve never foreseen those words to come out of my mother’s mouth. Interstate 4 in Orlando, Florida is the deadliest highway in the nation with an average of thirty-four crashes and mournfully my cousin was one of those numbers. Once my mother went into depth because she knew I had so many questions but didn’t have the strength to ask because I could barely breathe. She broke it down to me as easily as she could and that he was intoxicated and a semi-truck crashed into him at around 2 am. The surge of grudge came boiling up in me on why the truck driver wasn’t more aware, why the semi-truck couldn’t be driving slower, or why the truck driver didn’t stop quickly enough. You would be surprised that I kept this blame on the “perpetrator” I used to say, painting out this person to be the issue and the cause of my cousin’s death till I was about seventeen in high school. I realized with my own eyes the irresponsibility and recklessness of people with other people’s lives. The carelessness when someone completely under the influence offers to drive other people to their house or people just going home even if they clearly should not be allowed on the road. Rethinking back to my cousin I started to see both sides of the accident to where the truck driver should’ve been more aware but my cousin was the one illegally under the influence. Hard to admit as I’m typing this out but as someone who witnessed the poor choices of my classmates risking other people’s lives there is just no excuse to go out on the road because you are asking for an unfortunate mishap to occur. Knowing that brings me clarity and that people make dumb decisions but it’s up to you to learn from them or make the same ones.

To be honest I would admit I am an irresponsible person at times but I take these steps on a day-to-day basis to keep myself safe and others. I teach myself or simply research defense-driving techniques and due to there being a bountiful amount of resources with easy access, I’m able to have these skills for emergencies that could save a person’s life one day including me of course. Gaining knowledge is what we should all strive for, right? Having that eye-opening misfortune taught me to click back in reality when I’m speeding on the road rushing to get to my job because I might be late but once I put it in perspective I see that just because I had not planned to leave earlier should never be the reason for a person to end up being injured or dead. I tend to keep my emotions intact when driving because one of the steps to being responsible is to make sure not to react by a person cutting you off or driving too slow, never enhance the problem and cause more agitation because, in the end, you should only focus on your driving. Recently I’ve shared the importance of not driving under the influence with my friends to emphasize that I wish them safety since I care for them, therefore I offer to them if they ever need a ride they can call me, or if I’m with them I always offer to drive if they’re aren’t fully capable of driving. I always try to lead by example because when passengers or other drivers see that I’m patient, attentive, and respectful of the rules. They are likely or I hope I inspire them to want to behave in the same manner.

Driver education should be the utmost priority to ingrain in people. As automobiles unarguably are the main source of transportation there should be an understanding of road signs, right-of-way laws, knowledge of speed limits, and any other traffic laws to reduce the number of deaths. With education, we are taught fatigue awareness which is teaching drivers the dangers of driving while tired and promoting safe practices to avoid drowsy driving. Especially stressing the importance of seat belts and the use of child car seats has helped reduce the number of injuries and deaths from driving and without the insight into how to drive in certain weather we would have no idea of what to adjust the speed to or if we should pull over instead. Well-trained drivers will avoid errors that may result in accidents, and they will know better how to take action to avoid or meet any hazardous situation. Ultimately, driver education programs help develop a culture of road safety that reduces the number of road deaths and injuries.

Drivers should be taught defensive driving techniques because doing an abrupt emergency stop for a driving test should not be enough. For example, if you’re on the highway and there is a car driving recklessly you can’t just abruptly stop with other cars speeding behind you, being mindful of others is increasingly important and many like myself weren’t taught that until I took the time out of my day to ask my parents or do my research. Surprisingly for me when taking a driver’s license test online it was incredibly easy to cheat off and simply anybody with the help of an adult can easily pass the test with no knowledge of any road laws, traffic signs, speed limits, yielding the right of way, vehicle restrictions, parking restrictions, etc. That is the scariest part of how effortless it has gotten to obtain a driver’s license because, without the education of it, there would be an increasing number of deaths from driving. I’m saying all this because the importance of driver education is what helps everybody stay safe on the road and if these driver’s license tests that people are taking are this easy for everybody and not as efficient or helpful I can’t imagine the outcome for the safety on roads for everybody. Stating that prediction I feel as though having stricter criteria for the driver’s license test would be the best solution and by having stricter criteria there should be stricter regulations. In particular, the driver’s license test should only be taken at the DMV where people can be monitored and simply have to retain the knowledge by themself and with no help from others. Adding on the driver’s test should add more ways to respond in an emergency due to the variety of events that could take place on the road there should be more questions asked from the instructor on how to react and test to see if the driver can react in certain emergencies. Lastly informing kids from a young age on driver education will have the importance of being safe on the road deep rooted into themselves where even the kids could help their parents when driving and later on hopefully be a better and safer driver, with a brighter less traumatic future. I would change so much if I could but everything happens for a reason and all we can do is try to do better and help other people learn more about driver education because the best thing to do is to be aware of the road and road safety.