Does (Driving) Age Matter?

An Angelic boyhood becomes a satanic old age. (Angelicus juvenis senibussatanizat in annis.) Erasmus (quoted as a proverb invented by Satan)

Seems sensible to believe that it does. Young drivers tend to suffer from obvious inexperience. They also have something to 'prove' to their buddies, and that generally translates in some element of laxity with respect to rules of the road. Mostly commonly seen in their propensity to speed. They're also fairly certain to the point of rock-hard belief that nothing untoward will happen to them. When it happens, it does to others. Because, for the most part, they're invincible, and beyond the potential for accidents to occur when they're behind the wheel.

Youth beholds happiness gleaming in the prospect. Age looks back on the happiness of youth and, instead of hopes, seeks its enjoyment in the recollection of hope. S.T. Coleridge

Which is why, in today's paper for example, there's a little news story about a 17-year-old girl driving a car with a 19-year-old male passenger, causing an accident by speeding, hitting a vehicle driven by a 29-year-old woman. Injuries were not too serious. In the past week two teens were involved in a kind of 'coasting' incident where someone driving a car will haul along a buddy eager to prove just how invincible they are. One male hero got caught under the front bumper of the car.

The spring, like youth, fresh blossoms doth produce,
But autumn makes them ripe and fit for use:
So Age a mature mellowness doth set
On the green premises of youthful heat. Sir John Denham

And then, two weeks ago, a 93-year-old woman, a very energetic, enthusiastic woman who loved her car and also playing cards - according to her large circle of friends, lost control of her vehicle and collided with a transport truck. The truck, and its driver, are fine. She is stone-dead. Presumably she lived a happy enough life, as a very busy, engaged and well socialized elder. She was reputed to have been in very good health, for her advanced age.

And the latest? An 89-year-old man who drove his car into a liquor store. Who knew the advanced-in-age were so fond of their tipple? This man was shaken up by the incident, when his silver Honda Accord 'jumped' the curb, crossed the sidewalk and crashed through the glass storefront of the liquor store. Oh, then it wasn't the driver, but rather the Honda Accord that was so anxious to get into the liquor store.

Oops, no, it was the driver after all, he'd just happened to drive into the parking lot to pick up some beer. Happened to be pulling into a parking spot when the accelerator presented itself to his foot, instead of the brake. The car skidded for ten metres inside the store, which, fortunately, hadn't been too busy with customers at the time, and stopped in a puddle of spilled wine and liquor. It must have been ecstatic.

This is what the driver said as he was later interviewed: "It was a straight accident", "I guess fate decreed it. I sure didn't do it on purpose." Asked if he plans to continue driving, one supposes he was rather taken aback at the very question: "I don't know why not".

I know why not!

Surely a wiser wish were thus expressed,
at eighty years let me be laid to rest. Solon

A little more tired at close of day,
A little less anxious to have our way;
A little less ready to scold and blame;
A little more care of a brother's name;
And so we are nearing the journey's end,
Where time and eternity meet and blend. Rollin J. Wells