Away With Me, Lucille!
New Jersey recently underwent a change in its car insurance laws. Until a few months ago, New Jersey was one of three or four states to demand that all car insurance providers insure anybody who applied. Insurance companies might charge higher rates, but state law mandated that no one be uninsurable. Many insurance providers, including the big ones like Geico and State Farm, just stayed out entirely; those that remained in a less competitive environment still felt it necessary to spread the cost of dangerous drivers around. Insurance rates for even the good drivers were roughly double what you’d find in the rest of the country. For me, nailed for driving with an expired license, the price was prohibitive.
But now the law has changed. The big boys are back in town with their economies of scale, and prices are way down, enough for us to afford insuring us both. (In fact, it’s cheaper for both of us than for just the driver with the better record. Go figure.) So, once I pass the driver’s tests again, I’ll be back in the saddle, so to speak.
Driving again will be convenient. I can take over the wheel at night, when Eileene doesn’t like to drive, or over some of the longer distances in our upcoming trip to Arizona and New Mexico. I can drive myself across town to my Sunday role-playing sessions; more importantly, I can drive myself home. I can take care of small emergencies, like rushing out to pick up a relative with car trouble. There’s peace of mind in knowing I can take care of big emergencies, too, like getting Eileene to the hospital, should the need arise.
But for all this convenience, I do not feel the sense of liberation most people feel upon earning their license—that I myself felt at sixteen, for that matter. I suppose that isn’t surprising. Cars no longer symbolize, for me, an escape from this hick town to greater things, nor are they a convenient place to make out free of parental supervision. I’ve settled down, and I’ve got my own place, with my girlfriend living in it. Gone is the thrill of learning to drive for its own sake, the enjoyment of mastering a complicated skill. No doubt I’ll be a bit rusty, but the principle that you never forget how to ride a bicycle applies. No, for adults, driving represents a responsibility as much as opportunity: responsibility to fill the gas tank, to pick people up from the airport, to get to places on time, to drive at inconvenient hours.
Still, it’s nice to know I can again.