Having the Drive to Do Better

Having the Drive to Do Better

By Jordan McCracken

Driving is the deadliest thing a teenager can do, deadlier than enlisting in a foreign war. This is not a surprising statistic to me considering my personal experience as a driver on public highways or even in my high school parking lot. And everything starts at the education a person receives before being handed the keys to a two-ton vehicle of destruction. Qualified instructors teaching students every driving law in their state, the dangers of drunk driving, and the dangers of distracted driving is essential to preventing more deaths for all ages. Asking students to choose whether they want to become organ donors is a terrifying image, but it places a reasonable fear in their minds to be the best drivers they can be. But going past education, not all of us at any age can be expected to be perfect drivers all the time. We need a safety net in the form of police officers whose only priority is enforcing the rules of the road and, in turn, preventing avoidable deaths. In terrible weather situations, headlights and good car condition should be enforced by said police officers as I have personally almost hit a car because I could not see them coming through the misty fog. Because of multiple drivers refusing to flick the on-switch for their headlights, I stayed behind a large vehicle stopped and stuck in the middle of the highway lane. Cars lined up behind me as they could not force themselves to switch lanes either. Because someone didn’t fix their broken back lights, a car that could not see them crashed at seventy miles per hour, and I was a witness to all of it. To be a better and safer driver, I choose driving slowly or not at all over driving flawed as well as taking care of my vehicle. But to help others, I write this essay in the hopes that its readers relate to its story and its statistics as inspiration to do more or better.