For Safeties Sake

Before you are allowed to go out and do anything in this world you first must learn how to do it. You want to make a cake from scratch? You go ask your grandma to teach you. You want to buy a house for the first time? You must take a course on being a responsible homeowner. You want to make money and have a job? You either go to college to learn the skills necessary or you have on the job training.

In none of these scenarios do you just show up and do it. If you were to make a cake from scratch with no lesson or recipe. Sure, something will come out of that oven, but I wouldn’t want to eat it. They don’t just give you the keys to the register on your first day of work and let you do your thing. However, in order to get a license to drive a motorized vehicle all you must do is turn 18. This might seem fine, but an average of 34,000 people die each year as a result of driving.

If it was required that every single person that got behind the wheel had to take a driver education course that could lower that terrifying number. Then once this becomes a requirement it could be implemented that you must swipe your driver’s license in order to start your vehicle. Another way to decrease the number of deaths due to driving would be if we could make cars dead zones. If when in a vehicle all calls and texts could be stopped, other than those going to 911, the road would be a much safer way to travel. This may seem like very drastic and expensive measures but if it could save even half of the people that die on average every year due to driving, I think it would be worth it.

Thankfully I have never been in a serious accident. I have lost family and friends due to careless driving though. It has been 4 years now since I lost someone that was as close to a brother as me due to a different driver texting and driving. Before that, my mother almost lost her life due to a careless driver. Since then, I don’t stand for texting and driving. If you have something that you need to say and I’m in the vehicle I will type it for you. If you won’t let me do that then it isn’t important enough to be sent at this time.

I have friend that used to text and drive. I have some that probably still do when I’m not with them. However, I make it a point to try and keep everyone in my life safe. The road is dangerous enough with people that don’t know the rules to include a phone in the mix. If someone in my family ever needs to talk to someone else while they drive, we all use hands free to call them. This keeps us just a little bit safer and our eyes on the road.

One step that I need to take to become a safer driver is to stop listening to music. When I have music on, I am paying less attention to the road. In the past few months, I have cut back significantly on the amount of music I listen to in the car. Another way that I could become a safer driver would be to slow down. I don’t speed, but sometimes I do go faster than I should to fully be paying attention to everything that is going on around me.

As we approach the Christmas season I have a few plans on how to help those in my life become safer drivers. One: I live in Michigan where there is lots of snow. I plan to get everyone that I care about, that doesn’t have one, an ice scraper and brush with a long handle. This will allow them to better clean off their cars before driving so that they are safer on the road. Two: I will be getting some of my family members and friends the necessary cords so that they can connect to their vehicle hands free. This will decrease the amount of time that they are looking at their screes when driving. Three: finally, I plan to make a small flipbook telling them things that I appreciate about them and including facts in it about driving safe and facts about how scary the road can be. My hopes are that these things will help to decrease their distractions from the road and increase their awareness of both how much they mean to me and how scary the road can be.

In summary, I believe that everyone should be made to take a driver’s training course to receive a drivers license. I also think that the technology should be created and implemented so that only people with drivers’ licenses can start and operate a motorized vehicle and that all calls and texts excluding those going to 911 should be allowed to go out or come in when in a vehicle. I also think that it is important to tell those that are close to you the dangers of the road this winter and to make sure that they know how much they mean to you. That it wouldn’t be just their life that they’re impacting if they drive recklessly.