This is it: Another Way.

When I was 18 I, like most other 18 year-olds in my school, went to driving-school.  It was a costly thing to do and I paid for it all by myself. The total cost for me, including having to take the practical exam twice because I failed the first (which also included taking some extra practice hours), was around $2500.  I don't recall hesitating about whether or not it made sense to get my license.  It was a rite of passage of the most ordinary and common kind. I engaged with it and, eventually, got through it.  Perhaps the "vision test" that's required to get one's license has replace the "vision quest" many native peoples engage in as they step into adulthood?

The problem with this step into adulthood was that I didn't have a car. At the time I was making about $100/wk with tutoring, not a small amount. But when I sat down with my grandfather, who was working from home as an insurance salesman (until he was 92), I did not foresee that he would--with a few quickly scribbled down calculations--disabuse me, his first-born grandson, of the notion of owning a car. In fact, the effect of his run-down of the annual cost for a vehicle was severe enough to deter me for a long time from owning one. It was not until I had lived in the US for several years that I finally bought a car. In retrospect I think it would have been possible to own a car, even with no financial support from anyone else. It would have been financially risky, but perhaps it would have led to learn more about cars and motivated me to do some easier repairs myself (like so many of my friends did).

So what where my driving options? My father flat out refused to let me use his car. The argument was I wouldn't make enough money to pay for a repair in case I had a fender-bender. (Of course, they did let me live in the house not worrying too much about the damage I might cause. I only caused a little bit of damage!) My mother was willing to let me use her orange VW-Beetle--to the tune of .50 DM/km (about $.50/.6 mile) and I had to buy my own gas. Needless to say I didn't use the car much at all and on two of the occasions I used it, I did have a fender-bender (once with the Beetle and once with an Opel Kadett, a car which my father had passed on to her). My mother was quite upset about the damage (though it wasn't severe at all). And for the first one she organized a one-day event with a neighbor for me who knew how to fix such things. In retrospect I think I should have insisted that my paying her for every mile I drove (which, ostensibly, was for her carrying insurance, registration, etc.) should have freed me from more responsibility for the car. Of course, with my driving so little, she probably had not made more than a 100 DM from my usage, probably not even enough to cover one month's premium.  It should also have freed me from having to wash and clean the car (which she also made part of the deal).  Looking back at this now I can't help but think she got a sweet deal (if only I had driven it more and therefore brought in more mileage money) and I was quite stupid to agree to it.

Fast forward about 35 years.  My eldest, Noah, is now driving.  From the beginning of this period of his life it was clear, Noah wanted a car. I had tried to convince him that it would be cheaper to ride his bike, that he would learn more about the lay-out of our town by riding his bike, that it would provide him with necessary and good exercise to ride his bike and that, if he really needed a car, he could also use my car.  In fact shortly before he got his first car, I suggested he just use my van since I prefer to bike as much as possible. Noah would not be persuaded. What was most interesting about his insistence on having a car was that his wish to own one never made him susceptible to any kind of manipulation. For example, my parents offered him $500 towards a car, if he worked on his grades during junior year and ended up with an A/B final grade-report.  Noah recoiled from such deals.  He also didn't really pay much attention to saving money so he'd be able to afford a car.  His hope was he'd find a cheap jalopy and be able to use some of the money he earns at his job and take the rest from a small savings account we have had for him since he was born.

I was torn about the whole thing. On the one hand, my parents' strategies and ideas about owning a car had not vanished and a part of me felt strongly that Noah should not own a car.  I even considered making it harder for him to own one. Indirectly, by not helping with finding one, by not putting him on my insurance, etc.  In the end I didn't do anything like that. Rather than making the whole thing impossible (which I could have done easily) I decided that this might be an opportunity for practicing independence.  Here is a list of things I agreed to do:

--Noah's car would be insured by me and I would pay the additional premium
--He would be responsible for all repairs, tune-ups and other maintenance the car needed
--He would have to do all the leg-work needed to find an appropriate car (including studying craig's list and studying used-car ads.
--He would be responsible for figuring out the price of the car (by using Blue Book or something similar)
--Noah would, of course, pay for gas. However, if I asked him to transport Gabe or Jacob somewhere I would pay him $2 per occasion.
--I agreed to pay for the initial check-over for the potential new car.
--I put him in touch with our mechanic to organize the necessary appts.
--Last, but not least, Noah would have to do all the work that is involved to register the car.

Noah lucked out. He had looked at two cars. One was hugely over-priced and the person selling it was quite a jerk about it. The other was practically gone an hour after Noah had first found it. His luck came in the form of my good friend, George. George had been thinking of selling his old Honda Accord in order to buy a new Honda Fit. I asked him if he'd consider selling his old car to Noah. He agreed. And in the end he sold it to Noah for $100. The car has 200k on it, really is in mint condition and needed oly a new muffler. Noah was ecstatic . . . and so was I.

Here is a related but different fact: while Noah was still driving my van I noticed that he would drive with much more confidence when I was sitting in the back of the van and not next to him. Of course, for the time he only had his permit I had no choice but to sit next to him, but as soon as he had his license I switched to sitting in the back and let Jacob sit next to him. Lo and behold, Noah's driving confidence and ability to handle the car deftly but with care increased dramatically.  It was at this point I had to admit to myself that my hesitation about him owning a car had as one of its main roots my lack of trust in him and his ability to drive safely. I had to further realize that a part of his difficulties with driving had to do with my presence. In other words, in order to trust him I had to let go of him, get myself out of the situation.

This last statement is so deep, even I had to re-read it a few times before I could really fathom its meaning. This may be a common mistake we, parents, make with our children: we turn into their micro-managers. We tell them exactly what our expectations are and we watch them every step of the way to make sure they follow the road-map we gave them. Of course, what we're saying to our children by doing it that way is that we don't trust them. And in getting that message across to them--through something that looks seductively and appealingly like "good" parenting--we disable their ability to trust themselves.

A variant of such micro-managing is the principle that our children are free to do what they want, however, we parents will not support it financially. This, of course, means that our children's freedom is at best theoretical.  They simply don't have the financial strength to buy some of the things they want. It's a bit like the nowadays popular parental use of "choice-language." "It's your choice: either you eat your spinach or you go to your room." Really? What is the choice here? I can either eat something I detest or be socially exiled? Behind this strategy is the thought that children will learn to be responsible for something, if they're able to pay for it.  Or, in the spinach example, that they will eat it because they're afraid of being isolated.  In other words, we believe we can teach responsibility by using the threat of pain veiled as the illusion of freedom.

You may have noticed though that there are plenty of adults who afford things for themselves but then turn out to be quite averse to being responsible for what they acquired (houses, cars, clothes, etc.) In other words, the idea that financial power and responsibility go together is one that can easily be disproven.

When it came to cars my parents where clearly not in support of me owning one and they used money, or better they used the strategy of not giving me enough, to ensure their value was passed on to their son. However, when I was old enough to live by myself, but hadn't expressed a wish to do so, my parents jumped on an opportunity for me to move out into my own place; and they paid the rent. So, I ended up not owning a car, but living in my own apartment both a result of how my parents used money to steer me in a direction that cohered with their values.

In part due to Noah's unbending will about wanting to own a car I was forced to re-think these deprivation and limited resource strategies quite a bit. One thing I learned quite early: children are not likely to be responsible for something they don't really want to have. Whether it's a "learning toy" instead of the fun toy-gun, or an apartment instead of the car. It makes sense, in other words, for us parents to pay quite close attention to what our children's actual wishes are. One of the best such things I received (and it was quite expensive) was my first large fish-tank. It was truly what I wanted and I desired to be responsible for it. But when I decided that it would be "good" for my children to have a fish-tank (without them saying they wanted one) the present quickly flopped. It was a good hobby for me, but not for them.

As it turns out Noah knows quite a bit about cars.  He's been watching a British car show for over a year now and although he's not ready to start repairing one, cars seem to be familiar to him in ways birds and guitar playing are to me.  It makes sense to support something our children show an interest for, even a car.  Besides, Noah had been talking quite a bit about the independence advantage of a car for him. He can go to the mall when he needs to buy some clothes, he can go shopping for himself, he can see friends on his own time, he can pick up his brother from summer-camp and drive his other brother to his friend's house. The fact that Noah has a car and can drive himself has become an advantage for us as a family and for him as an independence advantage. Without my financial and emotional support of this wish of his he would not be in a position to learn independence in this way.

More importantly even: all "advantages" aside, Noah's ability to drive also has the "this is it" flavor from my previous blog about my son Jacob. Noah's driving gives me a recognition and respect for his adulthood, his readiness to fly out into the world. Yes, he is ready in ways quite different from those of his younger brother (who is now in Germany for six months). But both receive my financial support and both are exploring independence in just the way they feel is suited for them.  And that is the key to what I want to support in my children. This is it!