Peter Kenter
I have a friend who has never owned a car, never driven a car or even sat in a driver’s seat.
My friend is very particular about the vehicle he would never drive. It wouldn’t be a car but a pickup truck like the one in the opening credits of the old Sanford and Son TV series. A red 1950s Ford F-1 pickup. It is a much cooler vehicle than I am driving now, I’m told — a delight for young and old who would point and wave as he passed by.
My friend spent hardly any money at all on the pickup truck he will never drive. He never found it in a barn in Central Alberta or Northern Ontario. It never belonged to an old farmer, and he never paid just $2,500 for it.
My friend would never take the route I choose to take as I drive him somewhere. When I take the highway collector lanes, he’s already picked the express lanes. Take the express lanes and he looks longingly at the collector lanes, rolling his eyes. Ask him which lanes he would prefer as you access the on-ramp and he fumbles with the answer until you’ve committed yourself. Suddenly, he finds his tongue and clearly expresses his preference.
My friend is eagle-eyed regarding road signs. A firm believer in safety, he speaks up when I exceed the speed limit by three kilometres an hour.
My friend carefully counts the occupants in the vehicle (two) when we briefly enter a lane designated for three occupants between 3 and 6 pm.
“I’m only entering it as a turning lane to make a right turn,” I explain.
“If I were driving, I would have found another way to do it,” he says. “I would have taken a left turn back there. Then a right. Then another right and gone straight across the intersection.”
My friend is quick to apply the imaginary brake pedal on the floor in front of the passenger seat. Much quicker than me. He applies it relentlessly at the first sign of another vehicle or pedestrian. Or raccoon, squirrel, badger or opossum. I believe he brakes for autumn leaves as well.
Unique among non- and never-drivers, he’s also impatient, applying pressure on the imaginary gas pedal next to the imaginary brake pedal. Only here is he modest.
“I realize that I’m supposed to use the same foot for gas and brakes, but I find it easier to use both,” he says. “Eventually, all drivers will learn to drive like this.”
My friend is a mechanic. He can hear “little sounds” in the engine that are indicative of a problem.
“I think the engine is going to die,” he says.
I ask him what’s wrong with the car.
“Not my car,” he says. “If it were my car, I would have become one with the vehicle and I would already know what was wrong with it.”
My friend is environmentally sensitive. He takes rides with me to improve my karma.
“I’m reducing your environmental footprint,” he says. “Cutting it in half in fact.”
He doesn’t care if I drive out of my way to pick him up. Sainthood begins as I pull away from his house.
My friend believes in high gasoline taxes, because people don’t pay enough for gas. I agree with him only when I see him carefully guard his wallet as I fill up the tank.
My friend tells me I pay too much for insurance. His wife belongs to a club that will get him insurance for half what I pay. Considering his perfect driving record over the past 25 years, he can probably get it cheaper than that.
My friend called the other day to ask me for a ride. I told him to wait in front of his house.
“You didn’t show up,” he sulked in a phone call several hours later.
“You missed me,” I told him. “I drove by in that vintage red pickup you’re always talking about. Only I accidentally hit the imaginary gas pedal instead of the brakes when I got close to your house. Then I heard a little noise in the engine and drove to the nearest garage. Can you call a cab and come pick me up?”
“Who will pay for the cab?” he asked.
“You will,” I said. “With all of the money you’ve saved on insurance over 25 years.”
My friend hung up the phone, his driving karma intact.
