| ROSIE AND ME |
| Driving Miss Rosie |
| We were ecstatic when Rosie's mother and my parents arranged for Rosie and I to have driving lessons. Actually my father hired a professional instructor for me and her mother taught Rosie. Rosie was very confident. I was too cautious. We were opposite sides of the coin but we were both menaces to motorists. My instructor became a little paler every time we met. It took all his encouragement for me to venture through an intersection if there was even one car in the distance. The concept of merging was too terrifying to contemplate. My instructor knew I was not ready, but my father thought that he had spent enough money on lessons and decided it was time for me to take my driving test. Rosie had been exposed to all her mother's skills and faults, but they too considered that she was ready for the road. It so happened that our tests fell consecutively on the same day and were conducted by the same examiner, who soon came to regret reporting for work. My father drove us to the depot. My test came first. As I trembled into the driving seat and clamped my hands on the steering wheel, my body flooded with fear. All my senses left me. I couldn't hear the examiner and I couldn't see the road. Left to its own devices the car jerked along until going through a pedestrian crossing it hooked an old lady on to the hood. We were going so slowly that she only suffered minor damage. The examiner drove the car back to the motor vehicles branch. I did not pass the test. Rosie marched confidently to the car throwing me a sympathetic smile. She snapped her seat belt in place and screeched out of sight. She came back for the examiner and my father and I waited a long time before she returned. The car lurched to a decisive stop. Rosie and the examiner were engaged in an agitated discussion. He was scowling as he stormed into his office. Rosie slow-motioned towards us as she read the official looking form "How'd you make out, Rosie?" asked my insensitive father "Did you knock 'em dead?" "I just made a couple of mistakes," she said, crumpling up the pink paper and thrusting it in her pocket. My father tried to lighten the moment. "Should I tell the examiner that if he doesn't like the way you girls drive, he should get off the side walk?" We were not amused whe he bundled us into his car and drove home with exaggerated care. But we were a persistent duo and after several humiliating attempts we both emerged triumphant. Then the battles began. Rosie wanted to drive. Period. When she borrowed her mother's car, I would bow to the universal law of nepotism. On the other hand, when the car belonged to my parents, I didn't appreciate Rosie high-tailing to the driver's seat and claiming squatter's rights. "You drive too slowly" she complained." "You drive too fast, I replied. "You can't be too slow or too careful," I added quoting my mother who couldn't drive herself. When I was driving I tried to be aggressive, but Rosie's constant foot tapping tended to unnerve me. I would dance a jig upon the brakes and hesitate too long at four way stops. Rosie gathered a few speeding tickets and had more than her share of accidental dents. My driving record was unblemished so it was grossly unfair that my father believed that I was probably responsible for some accidents. He didn't seem to notice that it was Rosie who kept both the local car mechanic and the traffic cop occupied while I cruised safely down the freeway well below the speed limit. copyright 2001 Brenda Ross |
| Click on the links below for more Rosie stories |
| Please |
   |
 |
 |
| <New |
| The End of our Friendship |