Parallel parking, an interesting steering wheel, and learning to drive the family “floatmobile” created some strong memories for host David Reynolds. Jump in and take a drive down memory lane and look for connections in your family, school, team, or workplace. These short episodes are lifted from life’s lessons, challenging us to make decisions that matter. In a Moment segments are published intermittently, punctuating guest-focused Lead. Learn. Change. episodes. As you listen, reflect on your recent learning, recognize your potential to make a tremendous impact on others’ lives, and take decisive action that will lead to the change you seek to make.
The 1969 Mercury Grand Marquis
Never really driving
Driver’s education
A humiliating moment, but a learning moment
Applicable observations
Knowing the people that you serve
You have choices
Music for Lead. Learn. Change. is Sweet Adrenaline by Delicate Beats
Podcast cover art for Lead. Learn. Change. is a view from Brunnkogel (mountaintop) over the mountains of the Salzkammergut in Austria, courtesy of photographer Simon Berger, published on www.unsplash.com.
Professional Association of Georgia Educators: www.pageinc.org
David’s LinkedIn page: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-w-reynolds-5a5b0a36/
Which Gear?
It was a 1969 Mercury Grand Marquis. It must have been thirty feet long.
Burgundy, four-door, hidden headlamps, and 320 horsepower. Of course, I would never experience anywhere near those 320 in that car. Our only car, for a family of six, four who were old enough to drive, was only driven by my parents. My dad worked the late shift and his two “off days” were mid-week, so the car was seldom at home in the evenings, and never on Friday or Saturday night. Plus, our family income did not accommodate the insurance premium increase for two teenage drivers.
The average speed when I was behind the wheel was about two miles per hour. Seriously. The sum total of my driving practice at home consisted of parallel parking on some empty expanse of asphalt outside some unoccupied building in town. The fastest I ever got to drive that car was about 40 mph on the way back from my driver’s test. Then, I never drove it again. Ever.
The car was a behemoth, or at least it seemed so to me. Before sliding in behind the wheel of the ’69 Mercury, I had never driven any car at all–except that one time that my parents never knew about, and I most certainly didn’t know what I was doing then–and I was a bit intimidated by the sheer size of this automobile, one my brother and I rightfully called a land barge.
I looked up the specs, by the way, and discovered that the Marquis was not thirty feet long. It was just under nineteen feet. Still, quite long, no matter how you look at it. And it weighed just over four thousand pounds. It was huge.
Thankfully, Fern Creek High School offered driver’s education. Good ol’ driver’s ed. Eventually I learned to drive and was able to do so well enough to pass the class and the “live” (in-the-car) driving test. Enough of what I picked up that semester stuck for a few years until I actually had access to my own car. I remember one day in driver’s ed, slowly pressing the gas pedal, climbing out of the clockwise curve of a cloverleaf intersection, readying myself to merge onto a multi-lane highway. Two of my peers were in the backseat, Mr. Houchens, the teacher, in the front passenger spot, one of my eyes glued to the road where I was destined to blend in, and the other on the golfball encased in its little dome on the top of the dash, there to remind us to drive smoothly, so the ball did not fall off of its little perch. Then, out of nowhere, a car horn blared. I was startled. What was I doing wrong? Was I getting ready to hit something? I glanced into all of the mirrors I could find and I saw nothing. Not even one vehicle. Anywhere. Gripping the wheel more tightly, I continued to drive toward the end of the cloverleaf, the horn blaring nonstop. When I was able to end the turn and pull onto the stretch of road for the return trip to the school, the horn stopped, as suddenly as it had begun. As it turned out, this car had a strip of rubber inside the steering wheel, which, when pressed, or when gripped tightly, activated the horn. I had been honking at myself the entire time. Humiliation.
Arriving at the school, I put the car in park and that embarrassing moment was behind me. I did not want to repeat that scenario. And I didn’t. I learned from it. I moved forward. I am a better driver now than I was then. The improvement didn’t happen overnight, yet each bit of progress did occur in a moment. One moment I had no idea where that horn was coming from. Then, in the next moment, I understood perfectly what was going on. In that instant I learned something.
Other driver’s ed lessons came and went and I remember none of them. What I can say with certainty, however, is that the overwhelming majority of the time I drove, the car’s transmission was in Drive. Not Park. Not Neutral, and not Reverse. Changing gears was done via a column shifter. It was easy to see–and feel–what gear you were in. The R for Reverse and the D for Drive were right in front of you, on the steering column.
Each time I got in the car, a decision was made. Do I need to go forward or backward?
Then, it was foot on the brake, move the shifter, check my surroundings, accelerate appropriately, and steer.
Do that, even in a high-tech car today, and you’re on your way, in one direction or the other.
Daunting as a new driver. Second nature now.
Yet, we ought to occasionally shift to Neutral or Park, at least for a moment.
So, what about now?
What do your current surroundings tell you?
How are you assessing the situation you are in?
Are you clear about your destination?
Who needs to accompany you?
How will you know that you have arrived?
Have you thought about where you might be headed after that?
What is the first step you should take to make progress?
What is going on in your school, company, or organization? What, if anything, has recently changed?
Is there something potentially problematic that seems, at first, to be caused by others, or could you be inadvertently creating some confusion, as when I was the one pressing the car horn?
How well do you know your students, your patients, your clients, or your colleagues? Are all of you on the same page regarding your destination? Is there a shared direction inside your department or division? Do your students really understand what is expected? Do they know why?
What about resources? Whose help should you enlist to accomplish your mutual aims? Do you have the capacity to do what needs to be done? Does your team, your school, your enterprise?
What is a fair way to gauge the success of your collective efforts? In other words, what is the evidence that will indicate that a target has been reached, that the students understand, that the patient is improving, or that client trust has been strengthened? What about grading practices? Could changes be put in place that incentivize effort and eliminate adverse consequences for failing to meet a standard at an arbitrary moment in time?
Initial appearances, first impressions, may not be accurate. All learners do not bring the same set of experiences to the table. Different perspectives may not be wrong, they may merely be different. Most people want to make progress, they want to be successful, they want to make things better. Sometimes, though–maybe often–we are unaware of what “the others” are dealing with at the moment.
Is that student taking care of his siblings each night?
Is this student working nearly full time to help support her family?
Is another avoiding negative influences in the neighborhood so that they can be the first in their family to go to college?
These young people, your students, do not want to go backward. Nor do your colleagues or customers. They do not want to fail. It is our job to move forward and help others do the same.
What’s holding you back? Get out of Park. Move into Drive. You can use this moment to drive forward.
One moment your foot is on the brake and the next moment it’s not.
You have agency. You choose.
Which gear?