Generational Driving: Passing Down Skills and Memories

Fears of parallel parking

When our granddaughter came to stay with us in August, she was a little nervous about taking the driver’s test for her license when she returned home. Michigan still required new drivers pass a parallel parking test.

So we loaded up my Buick Acadia with makeshift cones made from pails and pool noodles and drove to an empty parking lot near us. I hoped my Arcadia’s cameras might help her with turning and positioning. After a dozen or more tries, she began to understand the mechanics, but wasn’t truly confident.

That evening, she found a helpful video that showed how parallel parking involves just two turns while backing into the space. Later, she found a Ru Paul TikTok that really helped cement exactly when to start turning, and then when to cut the wheel in the opposite direction.

Two turns

@rupaulofficial

Bumper? I hardly know her! Parallel parking made easy!

♬ original sound – RuPaul

Once I got the hang of parallel parking when I was a teen, the mechanics stuck with me. I laughed when I watched Ru Paul’s TikTok— it teaches exactly what I taught myself visually so many years ago — those two points in which you have to turn the wheel.

Anyway, the next day, I took my granddaughter back-to-school shopping in the morning at the Village of Rochester Hills. The parallel parking spaces along the road gave me a chance to put my skills to the test. Interestingly I didn’t use the car’s camera– I had to do it old style, a la Ru Paul. Nailed it. It felt good.

In the afternoon, my granddaughter continued parallel parking practice with my car. She aced it.

Grandpa’s driving test

When my husband, Don, was just 15, he applied for a job at a butcher shop. The store owner asked if he could drive a car. Don said “Yes, I can.” Funny thing, the store owner never asked if he had a license. Don used the owner’s car to deliver orders to customers!

Don took the family station wagon for his driver’s test in 1964. The instructor said “You’re driving a station wagon for your test?” Don told him yes. Then the instructor asked “Where are your parents? Did you drive here?” Again, Don said yes.

Apparently this was acceptable. He passed without a problem.

I remember a bad case of nerves when I took my test at age 16, especially having a straight-faced stranger in the passenger seat with a clipboard watching my every move. He asked me to cross lanes to make a turn; I questioned him, thinking this isn’t smart. But I did it, and I passed. The parking was the easiest part.

When I was 18, my father bought me a 1973 blue Duster with baby moon hubcaps. He saw it as a new toy. My mother, however, was not happy. She didn’t want me gallivanting around town. I did a lot of gallivanting. I loved that car. So did my girlfriends.

Do you remember taking your driver’s test? Can you still parallel park?

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Linda K. Sienkiewicz is a writer, poet, and artist
BUY BOOKS: In the Context of Love | Gordy and the Ghost Crab | Sleepwalker
New novel for fall 2026 Love and Other Incurable Ailments, from Regal House Publishing
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