by Dana Branham, editor-in-chief

My driving instructor, who I’d met three seconds prior, tosses me a set of car keys and tells me to go turn on the blue Corolla, but don’t start it. If I’m too hot, he says, roll down the window.

I give him this cool smile that tells him I know what I’m doing, but as I walk outside of the building, I feel this tightness in my chest. What’s a Corolla? I hope there aren’t two blue cars. What does a Corolla even look like?

Luckily, there was one blue car. I unlock it, get in, and do what I think he told me to do—I turn the car on. I adjust my mirrors and move my seat way up, feeling weird about where I’m supposed to put my purse and wondering why I can’t put my finger on what the car smells like.

Finally, the instructor walks out of the building and into the car. Immediately, this gruff voice asks me, “What’d I tell you to do? Why’s the car started? I told you to roll down the window if you were hot.”

I’d had enough. I almost burst into tears right then and got out of the car. Instead, I stared at the steering wheel and apologized and admitted that I’d never started a car before and I didn’t realize there was a difference between starting it and turning it on and I really hadn’t driven before and I’m so sorry.

Most of the drive was a tense haze for me. I don’t really remember the lesson, except that I kept looking over the wrong shoulder to change lanes.

Really, the incident most telling of how that driving lesson went happened towards the end of the lesson. We were about to turn onto 29th Street, which meant we were so close to returning to the driving school and so close to getting out of the car. I was cruising down the road (actually, I was going quite a bit under the speed limit and I could almost feel the glaring eyes of other drivers summoning me to go faster), when the instructor hit the brake on his side, hard. I gave him this startled what-was-that-for glance and he gave me this what-are-you-talking-about look and said, “Didn’t you think you should stop for a red light?”

“What red light?” I said, and I could feel the kid in the backseat (who was “observing” my driving, but really just putting his life in jeopardy) fight the urge to scream. Sure enough, we were stopped at a red light, no thanks to me, and I had genuinely never seen it coming.

At this point in my story, I know you must be wondering—she’s a senior, why isn’t she done with this stuff? Trust me, my parents have been asking me the same thing for months now. I guess you could say it’s one of the ways that I’m putting off the impending doom of adulthood.  C’mon. I’m sixteen. I don’t want to make adult decisions or even fill out college applications. As much as I hate myself for not driving already and therefore rendering myself totally reliant on other people for transportation, driving is scary in the same way that growing up is scary.

Maybe I’m clinging to some last remnant of being a kid. Maybe I’m just terrified of driving, of being in control of not only my life and wellbeing, but the wellbeing of every other person in every other car who’s sharing the road with me.

I’ve only driven a few times since that lesson. And I’ll keep driving, because I’ve promised my parents I’ll get my license in January, which is as soon as I’m allowed to. It’s a necessary evil, and even though I’m bad at it and scared of it, I’m going to learn to drive because I have to grow up. (Anyone, feel free to hold me accountable to that.)

Nobody wants to be an adult, admit it. I especially don’t. But this mysterious idea of real life keeps inching closer to me, so I guess I better put my hands on the wheel and navigate my way through this.