Name: Danylo Ryzhokhin
From: San Pedro, CA
Votes: 0
I was born in Ukraine, and like most from my country, my story is one of migration. My family and I moved as a result of war, and we had to learn what safety is all about the hard way. Currently, as a resident of California, safety is still something I think about every single day, just different. I drive almost 80 to 100 miles a day, and on the highway I’ve learned that safety is as delicate, and equally essential, anywhere else as it is on the highway.
When I hear “impaired driving,” I don’t necessarily think of drugs and alcohol. To me, impaired driving is any situation where you’re not fully engaging in the road. It’s not understood because everyone only sees it in its worst manifestations: the inebriated driver careening, or the manably, blamelessly intoxicated individual. But impairment insidiously gathers around you as well, when you’re fatigued, when your phone is ringing, or when you think you’re so familiar with the road that you can become a bit careless. Even some drivers who’ve been educated are short of that reality. They pass the test, remember the rules, but fail to remember that the human mind itself is the most significant threat.
What I see every day on the roads is distraction everywhere. Glow phones on windshields, eating by drivers with one hand, glancing at playlists instead of traffic lights. Fatigue is a huge one too, especially in Los Angeles, where commuters drive very long hours. You can watch the signs: drifting lanes, late braking, heavy eyelids. And then there’s complacency, the idea that “I’ve done this drive a thousand times, I’m fine.” But alcohol and drugs remain real dangers too, not just for teens but for adults who underestimate how even “a little” changes their judgment. All of these impairments lead to risky behavior, for they create false security at the cost of stealing momentary attention you need to react.
Driving home one evening, after a long day, I saw a car ahead of me make a hard turn into another lane. For a moment I thought they were going to run right into me. I took my own hard swerve back, heart pounding. I passed them and saw the driver’s head was dipped down, most probably texting. I recalled my own fumbling drives at the time, when my eyelids burned, or when I had the urge to glance at my phone. That close encounter rattled me. It made me aware of just how pervasive peril is, and how one human being’s mistake can ripple into someone else’s life for a lifetime. That story is my anchor these days: a reminder that no location is worth sacrificing attention.
That’s why traffic school and driver’s education are vital. They don’t just pass along facts; they shape attitudes. A class can show how drowsiness disables your reflexes just like booze does. It can show how a two-second glance at your phone is the same as driving blind the length of a football field. It can remind drivers that experience doesn’t obliterate physics. What makes such programs work is that they make abstract rules concrete consequences. They make young drivers realize that every decision on the road equals someone else’s safety.
Being “in the driver’s seat” to me is not just a function of how I drive my own vehicle, it’s about the ripple effect of every decision I make. I can share my experience with others, telling them about the night I saw a texting driver nearly cause an accident, or the road trips where fatigue nearly caused me to push myself beyond my limit. Those moments are not just stories, they are warnings. They give me the courage to be the person who says, “Let’s not gamble, I’ll drive,” or “Hang up your phone, it can wait.” That kind of responsibility doesn’t stop at the edge of my own car, it extends outward to everyone around me.
My background reinforces this perspective. Having emigrated as a Ukrainian, I have known uncertainty and learned that security is never assured. I learned from war that everything can be turned around in an instant if risk is not thoroughly thought out. That is the lesson that travels with me to the road. Every time I travel, I am reminded that hazard is not always visible, hiding behind the hurried text, the sagging eyelid, the shrug of “I’ll be fine.” Responsibility is what prevents fragility from turning into tragedy.
Every mile traveled on the road is a classroom. Drunk driving isn’t just a senseless headline or a box in a column of statistics, it’s the culmination of hundreds of small choices people make on the road. And just as it does in life, little choices accumulate. Driver’s ed teaches us the facts: alcohol slows reflexes, fatigue obscures judgment, distraction shortens attention. But the real test is after the test, when it’s not a matter of memorizing laws but living them. That’s where safety happens.
That carries over into my life as me exercising discipline no matter if anyone knows it, humble enough to recognize that I can make mistakes also, and reminding myself at all times I’m not alone on the path. Every time I drive, I am not only representing myself but also the faith of my riders, the motorists around me, and the pedestrians crossing the street. That trust, like safety itself, is far too valuable to waste. And if my story as a driver, and as someone who knows the fragility of life from far beyond the road, can influence even one other person to make safer choices, then I’ve done more than just drive. I’ve protected lives.
