Lead Foot

The summer before I got married, two friends and I drove up to Pennsylvania for another friend's wedding. It was a long drive, we had a lot of ground to cover and the speed limit was 60 on the majority of the highway through Virginia. Virginia, if you have never made the drive, is a long stretch of your drive.

It was a wonderful wedding, we cried, we laughed, we had a blast spending time with good friends and then we headed home. We got an early start and swapped drivers every few hours. I switched into the driver's seat sometime after we crossed into Virginia.

I set my cruise on 80. We had a long way to go, 60 was just ridiculous. Come on.

Sure enough a rookie cop stopped me going 82. (I think that was what the radar said) and I got a verbal thrashing from the cop as he wrote my ticket, "Have you no regard for your life or the life of your friends?" I cried for the rest of the ride home. I think it was 8 hours to Atlanta.

This ticket turned into a big deal. Had I been a resident of Virginia, they would have thrown me in jail for a lengthy stay and impounded my car. As it was, I was ranked in the dismal company of drunk drivers- another extremely serious offence.

To compound matters, I had to appear in court in Virginia and the date was set for a little less than a week after my wedding. More tears!

I immediately enrolled in a defensive driving course, hired a lawyer who got my court date moved back, got married, packed my bags and our first trip as man and wife (besides our honeymoon) we went to Botetort County and stayed at the Howard Johnson. It was no fun standing in front of the judge with the county prosecutor to my left and the cop who pulled me over to my right, getting reemed from all sides. But in the end, they reduced my speed, charged me a hefty fine and let me go on my merry 60 mile per hour way.

That was a turning point for me. From then on I was the buckled in, lights on, not even 5 miles over driver that everyone hates on the road. You could honk, you could flash your lights, you could yell out your window, but not for anything would my car go over the speed limit.

Then I got complacent. A few years went by. I had a clean driving record for the first time since I was 15. Not lying, I got pulled over for the first time when I was still 15 and my mom was in the car. It wasn't for speeding, though. And it was only a warning.

At some point, you have to realize that your lead foot doesn't save that much time. What's shaving 2 minutes off an hour long drive? And it's even worse when you have to do a little brake check because you might have been going a little too fast or might have been following a little too close and your two year old pipes up from the back seat "You going too fast, Mommy? Hit car?"

For those wondering, yes, I was going too fast and no, I didn't hit a car. I guess thats just how a break check feels in the back seat.

I'm trying to reform. I have precious cargo in my car! And it's really embarrassing when Jacob gets to this certain spot on a road we take to get to church and says "Weeeeee" as if he is on a roller coaster. Tony always gives me a look and says, I thought you slowed down?