The Sun-Herald

I dont drive, but I'm very driven

While waiting for a taxi to take me and my dog from Avalon to the Eastern suburbs I wondered, not for the first time, if I should learn to drive.

The fare was inducement enough; it could have flown both dog and I to Fiji and bought us dinner on arrival and not in a scruffy little place either, but a big posh one. Yes, it seems crazy not to drive. But last time I took a very long taxi ride I decided the same thing, and that was two years ago. I am now a thirty-something non-driver.
You may mock. Drivers often do. But I have come to the conclusion that driving is not part of my destiny (or destination). I'm a member of a small, rather sheepish club called The Driven, and we're born that way. Some of us just aren't meant to be at the wheel, just as others are not meant to dance Swan Lake or write a thesis on the Patagonian toothfish or be allowed around sharp objects unsupervised.
Early indications were that the latter was true of me and vehicles of every description. In the UK we had to sit a Cycling Proficiency Test before being allowed on the roads on our pushbikes. I was the first person ever in my school to fail it. First I flunked the slalom, and you could have driven a stretch Hummer between those cones. Then, when the instructor requested an emergency stop, I flung myself one way and the bike the other and it hit him. And as it was a boy's bike and not a little pink one like all my friends had, it hurt. His reaction offered the unfortunate episode's sole useful lesson: people reserve all their best swear words for cyclists.
After a similar episode with a friend's mum's Mini Metro in an empty car park, any driving ambition I'd had ceased and I grew accustomed to life in the passenger seat, the bus seat, the train seat and the back of a cab. I also learned to ride horses, but they're not really effective urban transport unless you're in the mounted police.
My non-driving friends and I enjoy the same elements of the passenger lifestyle. We like the view from the windows, the opportunity to read, listen to your iPod, use the phone or do your make-up. We're more likely to walk short distances, which is good for our health. We can drink as much as we like and still get in the car, which is not so good for our health but great fun. And a lengthy and passionate kiss is much easier if neither of you are driving.
I like to consider myself a helpful passenger. If someone cuts up or otherwise slights my driver, I will relay the necessary finger signs and abuse so he can continue to concentrate on the road. I can hold drinks and read maps. When in enviro-friendly company I can also boast about my tiny carbon footprint. And I don't have hefty insurance, petrol and parking fine costs to pay. In short, I know my place in the car: on the left.
But still. On days like today I yearn to drive spontaneously to the first beach that takes my fancy, playing my own choice of music rather than asking a belligerent cabbie to switch off his talkback radio or his blaring footie. I'd quite like one of those 'new car smell' air fresheners all of my own. And maybe a car, too. Only a little one, mind; never, ever one of those massive armoured 4WD vehicles women round here use to transport their kids, as if the kids were ammunition or personnel. You might as well taxi a 747 around town - except that would be safer.
It would just be nice to be more, well, portable. And as cycling is clearly not an option, it may at last be time to hit the road on four wheels.
Am I mad?