Stay Cautious and Conscious: How to stay safe while driving

I opened the shiny silver doors of my car and sat down in the searing leather driver's seat. I grabbed the seatbelt and stretched it across myself and clicked it into place. My dad sat in the passenger's seat next to me and handed me the car keys. The car grumbled to a start and we were ready to drive. After completing my online drivers ed course and my permit test I expected driving to be easy, that was not the case. However because of my drivers ed and practice with a parent driver I learned how to drive and how to stay safe while driving. Drivers ed is necessary for a new driver to learn about the road, their car and the rules that come with the responsibility of driving. Someone who doesn’t know the rules is more likely to break them which will lead to accidents and injury. I did my drivers ed online and had a parent as my driving instructor. The online education I completed taught me the rules involved with driving and how to stay safe while driving. One topic covered in these online videos was drunk driving. I believe that showing young drivers stories of drunk driving accidents was an effective way to explain the consequences of drinking and driving. Nevertheless, this issue is not just a problem for young people and every driver should be responsible to be safe while driving. One major way to reduce the deaths caused by driving is to educate young drivers to not drink and drive. Assigning a designated driver or calling an Uber home are easy ways to prevent an accident. Parking lots can be a dangerous place for drivers. Though most collisions might be at low speed they can still cause a lot of harm. My family experienced this when we got t-boned by a truck that was backing up at the same time we were driving out of our parking spot. In this case both cars were being irresponsible by not checking their surroundings. Thankfully both stopped in time and nobody was injured. We left the parking lot that day with a dent in the rear bumper as a souvenir of the accident and a new anxiety about driving in parking lots. In order to be a safer driver you have to not only follow the rules learned from drivers ed but you also have to be aware of the drivers around you. One easy way to keep yourself concentrating on driving is to put away the phone. Texting or calling while driving might seem fine but it only takes one second to lose your concentration and control of the car. Another way to keep yourself safe is by expecting other drivers to make mistakes. This means preparing to stop if another car doesn’t stop all the way at a stop sign and not speeding by because you expect them to. Being cautious and conscious while driving can save yourself and others from accidents.