By: Merilyn Simonds

Merilyn Simonds — Fri, 03 Nov 2017 16:01:19 +0000

I remember the moment my mother got her own car—inherited from my great aunt when she stopped driving—and I remember, too, when my mother had to give up the wheel. For her generation and mine, driving means independence; giving it up was the beginning of a gradual folding in on herself. For my children’s generation, cars are not the symbols they are for us: with our population so solidly urban now, many people don’t get a driver’s licence at all and, if they do, many don’t own cars. I wonder what form this rite of passage will take for them, what they will struggle to get for themselves and grieve when forced to give up.

Comments on: Let me drive!

By: Merilyn Simonds