Then in 1998 when I was in Standard Five, I admired a four-wheel drive that a priest in our church drove. I fantasized owning such a car when I grew up.
So much did cars fascinate me that when my brother Bob informed me that Dad once contemplated buying an automobile, I later on wished he had done so. Like it happened, Dad chose to buy a piece of land that was next to our home.
Despite the special appeal that cars have had on me, I have never achieved my dream of owning a four-wheel drive, simply because I haven't grown rich. Somehow, the circumstances that befell me at the university have conspired to rob me of an opportunity to earn good money. As I write this story, I still don't know how to drive.
There was a time I used to feel ashamed of disclosing that I don't know how to drive. But that no longer bothers me. In fact, I am kind of grateful that I never got into driving as a young adult.
For one thing, if I had acquired a car in my 20s, I wouldn't have discovered a love of walking that I now have. Given the way I enjoy walking, I agree with Donald Culross Peattie when he wrote:
I have often started off on a walk in the state called mad - mad in the sense of sore-headed, or mad with tedium or confusion. I have set forth dull, null and even thoroughly discouraged. But I never came back in such a frame of mind, and I never met a human being whose humour was not better for a walk. It is the sovereign remedy for the hot-tempered and the low-spirited.Apart from helping me discover a love of walking, my failure to own a car has also given me ample time to develop my skills in piano-playing, public speaking, web design and computer programming. I began developing some of those skills in a college I enrolled in after finishing high school in 2005.
Indeed, I am grateful for not getting into driving at an early age since it would have denied me an opportunity to develop skills that have made my life exciting. And cars, I am realizing, aren't that special as teenagers think.
To prove that cars aren't special, consider great men like Mozart, Isaac Newton and Abraham Lincoln. Those men didn't know how to drive, for they lived in an age before cars were invented. Yet they left a legacy that many in today's world can't match.
Indeed, cars aren't that special. But many teens view them as status symbols. So when they finish high school, they pressure their parents into enrolling them in driving schools. In their rush to learn driving, they miss acquiring skills that would make them self-reliant sooner rather than later.
Having realized that cars aren't special, I am glad that Dad bought a piece of land instead of an automobile. Boy, didn't the land enrich my childhood years when I went there to graze cattle! Even as an adult, I have relished going to that land to reflect and commune with nature.
Nonetheless, I still cherish my dream of owning a four-wheel drive. And should I achieve that dream after I start making good money from my blogging hobby, I will still be going for a walk in the morning. Walking, I repeat, is an enjoyable activity that makes us better, physically and mentally. Ciao!
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RECOMMENDATION: If you've enjoyed the above story on cars and learning to drive, you might also enjoy another one on "Striving to Get Rich" which I wrote some time back. Just click on that link in blue to dive straight into the story.
