Your dreams can come true, but you can also get whiplash - Writers Forum

martyn23 · 06-01-2006, 02:18 PM

Your dreams can come true, but you can also get whiplash

Today one of my many dreams came true. Unfortunately Angelina Jolie hasn’t seen the light regarding her choice in men and nor has my wildly uncontrollable mop of scrubbing foil hair decided that it would make itself smooth and manageable. Nor have I become an overnight icon or the beans I left in the back garden a huge fairytale bean stalk.

No, what happened to me was even better than that. Today is the day when I finally got behind the wheel of a car and within seconds had two near misses and suspected whip-lash. In my defence the first incident was in no way my fault and the blame fell entirely on the weakened shoulders of the un-spaciously aware worm that came juddering towards my drivers’ side door. Thankfully, his dad had the strength of a steroid boosted ox on protein shakes.

I think I should explain the situation a little bit before you either a) phone the police or b) think I’m fabricating the situation. Located somewhere in York is an airfield which is open to the overly confident teenagers and their wincing parents to practice their driving skills in moderate safety. (moderate as insurance is as useful as a paper raincoat)

Being someone who views cars in the top two or three things in his life importancay ladder, I began the typical teenage nagging tactic with my dad until he eventually agreed to take me and set about putting some whisky into a flask.

So as we set off this morning we went through all the situations that would end up in disaster if I didn’t brake and press the clutch. I wasn’t aware that when driving on a runway if a stone appears to be a different colour to the other stones, that could potentially mean that my steering wheel might fall off into my lap and I could go careering off into a yoghurt factory. But according to my dad it could and the only way to avoid this was to brake, brake, brake and brake.

Fair to say then that the previously mentioned near miss before I had even turned the key was not the best of good starts. This bad start was made even worse as I managed to make a total hash of pulling away in first gear. I never realised that such a small engined car had the power to fire both my dad and I towards the dash board at such a high rate of speed. As the belt dug into my dads chest he let out a slight grunt and after seeing my life reflect before my eyes in the Peugeot badge on the steering wheel I made a more high pitched giggle of elation.

Having cleared my throat and had a quick theory lesson I managed to pull away and start climbing up through the gears in a surprisingly smooth manor. This sudden ability to drive came to a rather ditch ridden halt when I approached a tight, moat lined corner. As my arms crossed over themselves to reveal the x-factor logo the car just kept on going forwards.
The ditch was approaching fast but I somehow managed to stall the car and gave my dad’s chest another car into concrete wall pounding. Another quick theory lesson had this sorted and I set about getting smoother and smoother with it all.

As with all people of an x chromosome structure, confidence gets a hold of common sense, therefore you wont be surprised to hear I was humiliated by a woman.

Increasing my speed down the straight section, selecting third gear, indicating right, pulling out, driving passed, indicating back in and pulling back into lane had left another driver trailing in my 20mph dust. This driver happened to be a woman also, so I viewed that as a win in race of the sexes.

I then came to a halt at the roundabout to revel in my glory to my seemingly petrified father. As I then tried to pull away from the roundabout something went horribly wrong.

Once again our heads and chests were treated to Tyson v Lewis style punch up with the dash board and seat belts. Getting my breath back only brought misery as the girl I had just drizzled passed pulled up along side me at the roundabout, looked left, looked right and pulled off. Right, I thought, I’ll just have to do it again. Clutch in, select first, apply throttle, seconds out, round two. Iiiiiitttt’ss a knockout. Bugger!

Eventually the corner of my dads head began to look like and apple so we decided to call it a day and (excuse the pun) head for the hospital. However, he has promised to take me back soon. Presumably when his head has de-swelled and he can breathe without a machine. I shall look forward too it.