Grown men who can't drive

[madcatladyforever]

AIBU or what! Just had a row with my DS who is not talking to me because he can't drive at 40 years old. There is no good reason why not, he's done all the lessons just can't be bothered to take the test.
His wife ferries him about everywhere despite the fact she's in very poor health and shouldn't even be on the road in my opinion.
He wanted me to collect him for the weekend a 7 hour round trip and I said no, I have slipped discs and I'm on tramadol, I can't drive for 7 hours.
I don't see why we should be unpaid chauffeurs all the time and I'm not doing it any more.
Not being able to drive completely limits their lives, they can't live in a rural area which they want to do, he can only take a job there is public transport too and he can't drive to any big store out of town and pick up furniture or tools or whatever.
It is driving me mad and I said to his wife, stop ferrying him about, he needs to get his license. What happens if you have to go into hospital - who is going to drive you there and back.
Now he is furious with me for "interfering" but if your mother can't say it who can.
I get the test is scary but if we never did anything because we were nervous we'd never achieve anything in our lives.

And of course grew up with parents who drove, and we used to drive to our house in France every summer. And know other people who drive and insist on taking cars.

(Pressed post by accident.)

When I take DD to Brownie camps, these are always in the middle of nowhere and require her bringing kit like pillow, sleeping bag etc. You need to drive.

Does that mean if the parents don't have a car, the child can't go to camp? So the children from poorer families are excluded?

@LetitiaMartin Unfortunately, yes. The presumption often is that everyone has a car so can get to any destination for the Brownie Camps. They usually finish on a Sunday as well, when public transport is less reliable. You could car share I suppose but there's a lot of kit to take.

@mathanxiety I am totally going to take your advice next time he suggests a trip to london!

.The presumption often is that everyone has a car so can get to any destination for the Brownie Camps.

Doesn't really sound in keeping with the ethos of the movement.

Doesn't really sound in keeping with the ethos of the movement.

I've been involved with the movement for about 24 years and this has not been my experience at all. We rarely expect parents to drop of/pick up kids to camps but if we do leaders coordinate with the parents/eachother to make sure that everyone gets a rode without it being a big deal.

@blurpityblurp why do you keep talking about your experience with your parents if you drive, very odd, I don’t even think about that anymore as it’s a completely different experience when you drive yourself. Are you very young?

Yes old age comes to us all but in the mean time I have been driving nearly 30 years. I have driven to Italy skiing, south of France, Paris, Spain, stopped off in quaint little villages you wouldn’t have known about and met some wonderful people. Yes I have also gone by train but you go straight to your destination, you can’t detour, say you see pretty village and think let’s stop and have lunch.

As I and others have said, it’s about planning for your life; not some other live you might have if you were a totally different person. That’s why all these ‘It’s fine if you live in London and are office-based, but what if you lived in deepest Renfrewshire and were a travelling salesperson?’ questions are so daft. Obviously this one isn’t quite so extreme, but the principle is similar: i.e. if I was desperate to tour the quaint villages of the Pyrenees, I would probably have to learn to drive to do it. But I’m not. We only get so much free time in our lives and there are dozens of places I’d love to see and haven’t yet - all of which I can see without a car. The ones I need a car for will just get pushed down or off the list, as will plenty I don’t need a car to reach.

Until you drive you don’t realise what you are missing out on. You will never know the freedom it gives you.

Alex50, your posts are extremely strange and I really don’t know what to make of them. Why do you keep talking as though “driving” is a permanent binary? The world is not divided into lifelong Drivers and lifelong car-shunning Non-Drivers. All the comments acting confused about how anyone who doesn’t currently drive can possibly have ever been inside a car, or the comments implying that anyone who doesn’t learn at 17 is permanently screwed and can’t possibly learn later in life. Such a bizarre attitude! In the real world driving is just a handy skill which people pick up as and when they need it, and some people need to use it loads and others not at all.

Like I said upthread, I know how to drive but I do not drive. Plenty of non-drivers know how to drive. I sold my car many years ago because I never used it and it cost an absolute fortune. I’ve since developed a medical condition meaning I’m not allowed to drive.

I mentioned my parents briefly once in the context of saying I have plenty of experience in travelling across Europe by car (in answer to your weird post acting confused as to how I could possibly have any idea what “car travel” is like). That’s not “keep talking about them.”

But you yourself haven’t driven round Europe, it’s a different experience to when your parents took you as a 12 year old.

Until you drive you don’t realise what you are missing out on. You will never know the freedom it gives you.

Meh. I had a car once, I know exactly what I’m “missing out on.” Didn’t like it, didn’t use it, don’t miss it.

You could say the same for all sorts of things. I could easily say “you’ll never know the freedom that comes from living in a world city/moving abroad/being a world traveller” but that would be twattish, since clearly most people can’t afford those things and plenty of people just don’t want them/it wouldn’t fit their lives.

Until you drive you don’t realise what you are missing out on. You will never know the freedom it gives you.

Alex you sound as if you've just swallowed wholesale all the guff car advertisers try to sell you. I drive. My car is currently sitting right outside my house. Later on today I'll use it to go and check on my horse and then to get to work. The car gives me some freedom, but everything comes at a price. This month I've spent a day's wages at the mechanics. Every month I spend a day's wages putting petrol in it.

As for direct travel, I've never known anything quite as door to door as my push bike. Cars are large things to leave sitting around and there are, quite rightly, restrictions as to where you can put them. Finding somewhere to park the car will always be more stressful than shoving my bike in the porch.

The 'car at any cost' mindset can actually be very restrictive in itself. In one job I was doing I was asked how on earth I was going to get into a town 30 miles away for a 9am meeting. The answer was that there were several trains an hour and the journey took 25 minutes. But all the drivers I worked with were so wedded to their cars that they had no idea that the train was more convenient and reliable for the journey. Plus I spent that time working on the train.

Driving is 'dead time' to me because you have to concentrate on the driving and there's nothing else you can do. Driving serves no purpose other than to get from A to B. On trains I can read, work, or watch something. On the bike I'm keeping fit.

Sure, travel by car has its uses. It's not the be all and end all, it's actually rife with problems, and we would be able to create better and fairer societies, that are kinder to the environment, if we thought more about the problems it causes and did something to tackle them.

Well we will have to agree to disagree, i’m so glad I can drive though, especially in a pandemic. I didn’t have to rely on public transport and could carry on my life as normal. Enjoy your non driving life and will enjoy having the freedom of choice of driving or public transport.

But you yourself haven’t driven round Europe, it’s a different experience to when your parents took you as a 12 year old.
Who said anything about being 12? I have plenty of family, friends and loved ones who I regularly travel with as an adult.

I don’t agree that travelling as an adult passenger is that significantly different than travelling as the driver. In certain circumstances it’s better to have a car and in other circumstances it’s better to use public transport. Cars give some freedoms but also limit freedoms in other ways.

I've lived my life as normal during the pandemic without being able to drive. Apart from school being closed of course.

I didn’t have to rely on public transport and could carry on my life as normal.

Case in point. I’m really glad I live in a part of London where everything I could possibly want or need is right on my doorstep meaning I don’t have to rely on public transport and can carry on my life as normal.

I’m not smugly twanging on about how “you suburban/rural dwellers don’t know what you’re missing out on, you don’t know the freedom that comes from living in a major city until you experience it.” Because I know that not everyone can afford to live in London and plenty of people would hate it.

I didn’t have to rely on public transport and could carry on my life as normal.

Neither did I.

I agree op. I think if someone can't drive it implies a degree of helplessness I find deeply unattractive. I would also put being unable to cook, or do basic household repairs/maintenance, like plumb in a washing machine, on the list of unattractive helplessness, also financial independence. I would put being unable/unwilling to navigate public transport on my 'unattractive helplessness' list as well. Maybe I have particularly high standards I do have a lot of respect for people who choose public transport for environmental reasons over driving, less so if its because they can't drive. I don't really get the 'no desire to learn' lot. Why wouldn't you want to be able to drive? It's a basic life skill most adults can do?
I think there is a very strong argument for teaching driving at school/college. There are so many driving jobs out there and also jobs that you need to be able to drive to either get to or do. Driving lessons are so expensive, if poorer children just can't afford to do it it's yet another way they are disadvantaged.

I think if someone can't drive it implies a degree of helplessness I find deeply unattractive.

Why are they ‘helpless’? Are you like the pp who thinks non-drivers who want to go somewhere have to sit at home staring wistfully at the car on the drive until their partner arrives to drive them about?

I do think the heavy weight placed on attractiveness is a bit odd, but we all have our own tastes I suppose. Who knows how many men I’ve inadvertently put off by not driving! (Would I have pinged back into gorgeousness again if I’d handed over medical reasons explaining it? We may never know.)

@KenDodd, you actually judge someone’s attractiveness on whether they can drive or plumb in a washing machine? To me that’s as shallow and superficial as judging on whether they’ve got the right haircut. I can’t plumb in a washing machine, I’ve never needed to, I pay the guy who delivers it to do it for me.

Why would someone who has always lived in an area with excellent public transport and has every intention of always doing so, spend ££££ on acquiring a skill they’re never going to use? A skill that increases their carbon footprint if they do exercise it.

Driving is one of MN’s obsessions. If someone doesn’t drive to its insanely high standards, there’s a chorus of “Shouldn’t be on the road”, yet it’s apparently deeply unattractive if someone chooses not to be on the road. The sooner those driverless cars become the norm, the better.

Until you drive you don’t realise what you are missing out on. You will never know the freedom it gives you.

But then you'd also need a car. It's an expensive device to keep just to have the option to drive.

I think there is a very strong argument for teaching driving at school/college. There are so many driving jobs out there and also jobs that you need to be able to drive to either get to or do. Driving lessons are so expensive, if poorer children just can't afford to do it it's yet another way they are disadvantaged.

I do actually agree this would be a good idea. I would still have been absolutely terrible at it, but I could have found out for free.

Paying for driving lessons for every eligible 17-year-old our of public funds would end up costing a fair whack, though.

I’d prefer that money spent on expanding public transport and active travel options that more people would be able to use at all points in their life.

I agree with GoldenOmber. Driving is one of the least environmentally friendly modes of transport. Money shouldn't be invested in teaching more people to drive, money should be invested into improving public transport so that LESS people need to drive.