I never thought I’d say this. Had I seen this three years ago, I couldn’t not have recognised myself as the author. But right now, I would give just about anything to be able to drive again. The DVLA, in particularly festive spirit, formally revoked my driving licence as of Christmas day. In real terms, this didn’t mean very much and was little more than a formality, as I had already surrendered my licence and taken myself off the road some months before.
When you live in London, as I did for twelve years, car ownership doesn’t make a lot of sense. In fact, it’s only too easy to be lulled by the press into believing that motorists are at fault for more or less everything. But, of course, London has various cheap and efficient public transport systems that make moving about a breeze. At this point, Londoners usually sit up and object (saying their transport arrangements are neither cheap nor efficient), but I would invite them to travel away from the city for about an hour in any direction, and take a look at the transport situation there. That’s right: the only vaguely efficient infrastructure in place simply takes you back from whence you came. So, when you’re out here in Zone Q, the significance of the car ramps up.
Take the most revolting and objectionable thing you can think of – if I could exchange it for a driving licence I’d be there in a snap. I’d eat any creepy-crawly known (or unknown) to man. I’d do the most dangerous and low-paid jobs – hell, I’d even by Gary Glitter’s PR man. Dammit, I’d set myself on fire while singing the greatest hits of Jim Davidson if it meant I could get my driving licence back. But none of these things will do it – all there is to do is sit and wait… and wait…
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Having been proved right, or rather not proved wrong, the neurologist had proceeded with treating me exactly as he had said he would. The quantity of drugs were to increase week by week until I hit the magic quantity, and then I’d continue at that level for the rest of my days. Providing I didn’t fit, he saw no reason to scale the medication back down, as it’d only increase the chances of me fitting again and therefore losing my licence for another year. I’d also be tested (and tested and tested) for side-effects, abnormalities and anything else anyone could think of on a regular basis.
Once I’d got the hang of getting hold of repeat prescriptions, it was all fairly straightforward. For some reason, the taxpayer foots the entire bill for those of us taking treatment for epilepsy, so it’s not even costing me the standard prescription charge. All I do is renew with the pharmacist every month (it seems dumb that I can’t get larger quantities less frequently, but I’m not complaining), take a bunch of tablets twice a day, drop in at the local surgery every six months for blood tests, and that’s basically it.
Just as he said he would, the neurologist also factored in my bipolar disorder when prescribing the medication. Curiously, quite a number of anticonvulsants also have mood-stabilising properties, so there were a good few drugs from which he could choose that would tackle both at once, providing he got the dose right. So I followed all the instructions, and the months began to roll by.
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Unless the forthcoming incarnation of the Vauxhall Corsa is significantly better than the current one, you have to wonder about the true criteria for the title of Car of the Year. The one I drove screamed “I was built to a budget!”. It certainly was quiet, as long as you left it idling out of gear and didn’t attempt to drive anywhere. Unladen, it needed over 4000RPM to do 70MPH in favourable conditions. It found every imperfection of the road surface and rammed it into your lower neck. After three hours of motorway driving, it left me with muscular pains in my thighs for four days. Thank goodness I don’t have to drive it anymore.
I’ve driven a fair few cars, some of which I’ve reported upon before. There are now a few more to add to that list, as follows:
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“In the first year of driving, one driver in five is involved in an accident“
That nugget of wisdom comes straight from the Driving Standards Agency, and they should know. Were the world more symmetrical, four other new drivers would sleep a little easier tonight.
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This year, many things have changed for me. One of the most immediately significant, upon leaving the security-blanket of the Jubilee Line, has been passing my driving test.
More than by luck than judgement, I reached the other side of the high-risk age group (as the insurers so coldly put it) before attempting to drive. I’m lucky enough to be one of those people who picks things up quickly, so I started learning and practicing at the end of June and passed mid-August. Almost immediately, again more by luck than judgement, I walked into a job that sees me doing quite a bit of driving – not least because, as I don’t drink, I’m usually the designated driver after a piss-up.
Driving a car is, for the most part, pretty easy. Once you can get the thing to go where you want, it’s just a question of thinking about where everyone else might want to go in theirs, and trying not to be in the exact same place at the same time. One thing that has really struck me, however, is the sheer variety of cars – all with their own strengths and weaknesses. I hadn’t realised, before driving, just how different the machines are from each other. Seems kind of obvious now, but when you’re a pedestrian, a car is a car is a car.
So, here’s my thoughts on what I’ve driven so far:
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