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All rage no road: stories of driver’s licence failure

Leo Shanahan

by Leo Shanahan

31 Dec 05:55am

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Filed under: Driving, Licences, New Years Resolutions, Youth

43 comments

Lying about having epilepsy was when I hit rock bottom on the excuses spectrum.

Rare footage of Leo's driving test

But when faced with the perfectly reasonable question from a Canberra cabbie who had picked me up twice in a day, as to why a seemingly healthy 27 year old did not just drive himself, I blanked and then came up with: “well I have epilepsy you see, stops you driving.”

Firstly, apologies to any epileptics reading this for using your problem as an excuse to escape the embarrassment of not having my driver’s licence, as well as using possibly factually inaccurate information about epilepsy impeding your ability to drive (a friend with epilepsy just mentioned this once so I especially apologise to him).

If it’s any consolation the cabbie didn’t buy it. It may have been his sub-continental ability to read bullshit or just the fact that I came across as exactly what I was: a bloke who was too lazy to get his driver’s licence.

It is not entirely clear how this happened. Much like the explanation from Steve Carrell in 40-Year-Old Virgin - it just never happened. In fact the relationship between cars, women and virginity is often cited to me as reason why I should have had my licence earlier. To these people I would point out that I didn’t exactly go to the high school in Grease, and that getting into the T-Birds to achieve an in with the Pink Ladies was never my modus operandi.  Perhaps the guys with cars did have more fun, but ignorance was bliss as far as I was concerned.

Cars were just never something I cared about as a teenager, and most women never cared whether I had my licence or not. At university if I was feeling particularly savvy about it I could turn it into some kind of feminist issue: “of course, you could always mess with the paradigm and pick me up?”

The increasing “awareness” of climate change in these years helped a great deal. By merely mentioning that I simply rode my bike or skateboard to the party it implied a choice not to drive out of concern for global warming, rather than simply not possessing the ability to drive. Anyway, when you drove you couldn’t drink, so driving really wasn’t ticking many boxes for me.

Justifying a seat in the car on road trips was easy enough. Possessing a combination of navigational and raconteurial ability I argued my presence to be a necessity - and preferably in the front seat so as to also have access to the music collection (DJ being another talent to offer the car).

It’s not as if I never tried to get my licence. There was three separate summers when I was a few lessons away from a licence (the ACT has a great log book system which has been allowing inept teenage drivers on the road for years). One was interrupted by a trip to India another by getting a cadetship and having to move to Melbourne.

The question of my profession is probably the most astounding part of my going this far in life without a licence. There are many editors who, within their rights, would simply have told me not to come back into the building until I was holding a licence. My only saving grace has been working for sympathetic and similarly befuddled individuals, and the fact that photographers like to drive. Well that’s what I told myself anyway.

It would also help the cause if driving instructors were not, in the main, complete lunatics.

My experiences with driving instructors have ranged from being told by one that, despite the advice of my optometrist, glasses were not necessary for driving, to being sussed out by another as a potential customer for his sideline pot-dealing business (although another instructor offered me wholesale cigarettes for $5 a pack, so she did score a customer that day). While trying to learn how to drive from these people you are bombarded by bizarre rants on subjects ranging from immigration to their divorce settlements, so meandering and unhinged they would make Bob Katter blush.

But blaming driving instructors is pretty pathetic. Surely whatever affliction they suffer is dwarfed by pathological inability of a perfectly healthy person to delay obtaining a licence by 12 years.

Right now I am looking at another year drawing to a close without a driver’s licence, and another New Year’s resolution failure. While trying to present driving holiday destination ideas to a girlfriend long since over my passenger side charms, I get the distinct feeling that, one way or another, she won’t be seeing in another New Year with this non-driver. This is the point at which New Year’s resolutions turn into more pressing ultimatums.

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43 comments

Show oldest | newest first

    • TChong says:

      06:53am | 31/12/10

      Leo - good article to finnish the year
      1) epilepsy - people who have epilepsy are usually asked not to drive , while the cause of the seizure(s) is investigated. After , ( if ) the cause is identified, patients are usually prescribed one of several medications that do a pretty good job, BUT usually need periodic reviewing to maintain the effect.
      Some seizures can have very quick onsets - not a good way to drive.
      Most epilepsy pts are responsible enough not to try to push their luck by being behind a wheel too often or unecessarily.

      2) Not driving ,as an endearing pick up line to feminists . ?
      Did it work?

      Pot dealing driving instructors LOL . Weed on Wheels.
      Only in the big cities , I tells ya.

      Reply

    • fairsfair says:

      08:40am | 31/12/10

      Jetts Law has recently (within last couple of years) been passed in QLD. If you have one seisure you are told not to drive until a Neurologist gives you the go ahead. If you have a second seisure your license is revoked for six months. Another sisure… another six months. Needless to say you are put on a relatively high level of meds - ideally you should be weined down to determine the level at which you are set, however in doing that you run the risk of another seisure and another six months.

      Great article Leo. This has more than anything hilighted the fundamental differences between people. I could not live without my license and car (I think it is a control thing) and given I got it on the day of my 17th birthday I was dying to get out on the road. You however, just don’t care, primarily because it is not a necessity, but as you say - it just has never been a priority. Interesting, and the principle could apply to anything and everything in life really.

    • Old Clive says:

      06:58am | 31/12/10

      I received great insight from reading this article, I don’t think that epilesy is the real problem, I am firmly convinced that it is a gene thing, T am firmly convinced that all aspiring journalist have a gene that enables them to bull shit their way through life and produce products from the bullshit gene that is supposed to encourage poor nongs like me to believe that they know what they are talking or writing about.

      Reply

    • deb says:

      08:14am | 31/12/10

      i drive and i have epilepsy.i have regular checks to make sure my meds have things under control and if i didnt drive i wouldnt have my job,no transport in the countryside.fine line to be sure.but its hard enough to be epileptic without di#$$hds making jokes about it.keep up the bad taste jokes and soon i wont even be able to get a job cleaning loo,s.

      Reply

    • Daemon says:

      08:36am | 31/12/10

      Deb you just did that to be be catty. With at least 5 apologies for using an excuse to someone who wasn’t effected, I think Leo has done a fine job. I might suggest I guess that the issue with jobs and the keeping of same may be less to do with your (well under control so not an issue) epilepsy and more to do with your attitude, which could certainly use some work, premised on the little gem you so thoughtfully shared this morning.

    • mum of three says:

      11:46am | 31/12/10

      Deb, I clean loos for a living.  It pays well, keeps me fit and is flexible enough to fit around the needs of my young family. I am proud to be delivering a service that makes peoples lives that little bit easier.  Forget your epilepsy, you would need to improve your attitude before you would be lucky enough to get a job cleaning loos like me grin

      Great article Leo!  I had one driving instructor who admitted to having a bit of a “thing” for girls in private school uniform!  Was a bit of a challenge staying focused while being leered at, which is probably why I drove the car through a roundabout that first lesson.  Dad picked up the job after that, got my licence first go!

    • Chris L says:

      02:18pm | 31/12/10

      Good for you Mum Of Three! I always thank the cleaning staff whenever I see them ‘cause I despise using dirty toilets.

    • linda says:

      05:19pm | 31/12/10

      anyone cleaning loo’s deserves the utmost respect. I always thank them if they are working away when i drop in too public loo’s. Also i have always found that they are happy people with a big smile…something i feel Deb may have trouble showing, let alone sharing.
      I have major panic attacks if i try to exit my town limits. so I may have a licence, but it does me little good.

    • Reg says:

      09:10am | 03/01/11

      Hey Mum of three I wouldn’t baulk at cleaning loos like you. smile

      I have a son who has had up to 60 and 70 seizures a day after which the meds brought on schizophrenia, he is now well controlled but I am horrified to find that he has been cleared to drive. His short term responses are far too slow and I secretly depend on the system to refuse him a license. Even L plates under an instructor are too much. But this is vastly different from a person who has the occasional or rare, slow onset seizure, anyway penalties are likely to cause that person to conceal their condition.

      I’ve never been able to decide whether it’s Canberra drivers or Canberra bike-riders that are the greatest threat to humanity, but there are clues in this article.

    • S.L says:

      08:18am | 31/12/10

      Since I have been working in the public transport industry I was amazed at how many people never drive. I know many family guys and even whole families of a few generations that have never driven in their lives! It’s just never been an issue. They usualy live near a public transport hub otherwise they walk everywhere!
      A mate of mine only got his licence at 45 so he could travel to a new job he couldn’t access by public transport. His excuse for not driving always was “I drink too much!” On that issue I believe him….........

      Reply

    • martinX says:

      08:20am | 31/12/10

      “Anyway, when you drove you couldn’t drink, so driving really wasn’t ticking many boxes for me.”
      You can’t drink ride or drink skate either. Although they can’t take your licence away if you don’t have one, I’m sure someone in the legal system somewhere would think up a suitably nasty punishment for transgressors.

      Reply

    • Gerard says:

      04:59pm | 31/12/10

      Yeah, but take away the legal consequences and look at it as a moral decision. You ride a bike or a skateboard while drunk, you’re endangering your own life; the chances of killing someone else are negligible.

    • linda says:

      05:26pm | 31/12/10

      You can’t drink and ride a horse either. I was surprised to be riding along the side of a double lane highway in country Vic…..UDL in one hand ( i rode through the drive through bottle shop and Macca’s before heading home ), smoking while talking on mobile in the other hand, Macca’s in my lap on the saddle and the cop car went past me ....funny thing was, they waved a smiling hello to me and drove on….maybe they were city cops and thought i was “country cute”???
      I was not drunk, but I know the law states that even when riding a horse, one must “pull over to the side of the road to use a mobile phone while aboard a moving horse” lololololol

    • Reg says:

      09:18am | 03/01/11

      We had a neighbour charged with being drunk in charge of a horse and not carrying regulation lighting. He didn’t know which way was home and he depended on the horse to get him there. Makes sense to me.

    • Matt says:

      08:55am | 31/12/10

      I’ve got two sisters who are currently trying to get a driver’s license, and it isn’t easy - it’s what, 120 hours of driving before you can do the test? I think not having a license will become much more common!

      I myself was similarly slack and didn’t get it until I was 29. It was too easy for me to use public transport.

      I still catch the bus to work every day, but I’m glad I have my license.

      Reply

    • Allan says:

      09:03am | 31/12/10

      I didn’t get my license till I was 27.  No particular reason.  I used to justify it as “I don’t have a car.”  Looking back, it was monumentally stupid of me not to get it at 17.  Cars offer you freedom in a way that you don’t really understand until you can actually just get in one and go somewhere, anywhere.

      Reply

    • Cat says:

      09:15am | 31/12/10

      I have never had a driver’s licence. A licence is a responsibility, not a right.  Yes, it would be convenient at times but I am much too old to think about it now and, if I am honest, I have managed perfectly well without it. Most people could. Not everyone needs a car - even many of those who believe they do. You just organise your life a little differently.

      Reply

    • Chris L says:

      02:23pm | 31/12/10

      I’m with you Cat. I’m currently on my 38th year and still haven’t gotten my licence. Driving is a responsibility and too many people (and pets) lose their lives to careless motorists.

    • Gerard says:

      06:16pm | 31/12/10

      No, it’s a right. Freedom of movement is a right. And since the NSW government has dismantled all the public transport infrastructure this state once had, it is necessary to drive places. The NSW government and its cash cow the RTA have no moral authority to dictate what rights we do and do not have.

    • rudy says:

      10:07am | 01/01/11

      I agree that a licence is a responsibility, not a right. The problem is too many drivers like Gerard who see it as their right to be behind the wheel.

    • Phoenix says:

      02:57pm | 01/01/11

      @Gerard, sure, freedom of movement is a right.  So you can walk or live near public transport, or get a job close to your house.  Doesn’t mean you get to use a dangerous piece of equipment if you haven’t proven you’re capable of using it (or, if you’ve gotten your license revoked, have proven you can’t use it)

      God, there’s sure a sense of entitlement on this website sometimes.

    • Gerard says:

      05:20pm | 01/01/11

      Phoenix, getting a licence in NSW has nothing to do with proving that you can control a car. There is no testing at high speed, in the wet or at night. The only thing they check is whether you know the road rules the RTA makes up for the purpose of revenue raising. The licencing system is just one more scheme to rip money out of motorists’ pockets.

      As fas as a sense of entitlement goes, I’m afraid I can’t hold a candle to the politicians and bureaucrats who implemented this rort.

    • mary says:

      07:30pm | 01/01/11

      Freedom of movement goes all the way back to Magna carta. One does not need a license to ride a bike, skate board or horse and cart. It takes one afternoon to learn how to drive a car but years and years of careful practice to become a safe and responsible driver. If licenses truly were about having safe drivers on the road, the average teenage boy shouldn’t have one nor should any one who has ever been caught drink driving and yet they do. Combined they account for 50% of fatal accidents.

      Driver licenses give our government revenue and a means of keeping track of their citizens, now more than ever with centralised data base and tracking devices built in them. Any surveillance camera will soon be able to tell big brother who we are and where we are and who we are with.

      Don’t buy the nonsense of licenses keeping us safe from bad drivers. Far from it.

    • Biased says:

      10:28am | 31/12/10

      All the people I know who don’t have a driver’s licence (which is pretty essential in the public transport starved outer suburbs of Melbourne) seem to use the excuse that they don’t need a licence because they always manage to get around ok. What they don’t realise is that the people who pay the price for their lack of a licence is all the people in their life who are constantly inconvenienced because they have to go out of their way to pick up and drop off said licence-less friend, not to mention the extra fuel costs also incurred by those licensed folk.

      I believe economists would call this an externalised cost situation.

      Reply

    • Chris L says:

      02:34pm | 31/12/10

      There’s no law saying you have to drive your friends around. You’ll do it if you want to.

    • Gerard says:

      06:03pm | 31/12/10

      All the people I know who have a driver’s licence use the excuse that since the public transport system in Sydney doesn’t work, they can’t get around without it.  What they don’t realise is that the people who pay the price for their failure to stand up to the NSW government’s opportunism are the people who are constantly inconvenienced because they can’t afford to pay hundreds of dollars in speeding fines for driving 115 kph on a dead straight three lane motorway at the bottom of a steep hill in dry weather.

      I believe economists would call this the grabbing hand.

    • Tracy says:

      10:31am | 31/12/10

      When I got my license in ACT 30 years ago it was so easy, it would have been slack not to have one if only for use in emergencies. There weren’t even P plates in ACT! You got your permit, then whammo, 3 months later go for a test and pass. It must be so bloody hard these days it’s no wonder many don’t bother. However, you never know when you might need one for work or because you move to a place with no public transport (like where I live!). Anyway…I enjoyed this article. And before anyone jumps up and down and says I’ve probably had lots of accidents with such an easy license grab…none at all, because my Dad, who taught me, would KILL me smilesmile

      Reply

    • Philip says:

      11:10am | 31/12/10

      I know someone who has a driver’s license but never drives.
      The reason she keeps it is so that she has some form of photo identification to satisfy the people who work in customer service positions who are a kangaroo short of a top paddock but need to see some form of ID and can only ask for a driver’s license.

      Reply

    • agony says:

      11:17am | 31/12/10

      Last year a doctor decided that the state of my body made driving not safe.  My body had not changed, I had been telling her what the pain was like for a long time, she just saw an ultrasound of inside my feet and told me that the law said that all she had to do was tell me to go and hand in my licence, and then it was my responsibility.  As I struggled to take in what she had just said, she added:  “So consider yourself told”.  No, she is not my usual doc, but one I have to see on and off.  And in the flat delivery of one sentence she took away from me my GP, my Psychologist, my chemist, the shop where I buy fabric, the ability to just pop out for milk, and a great deal more that I have not come to terms with, or come across yet, so those hurdles still wait.  I can’t even drive to the place to pass in my licence.  I have to try to find one that I can access via public transport.  I need to go, not just post, because at the age of 60 I will suddenly need an 18+ card for proof of identity cards, such as when I send parcels overseas.

      Life has changed for me, so drastically and completely, and this skinny cold little sod of a doctor was just laughing - “so consider yourself told”.

      I am trying to work out how to get to places using the bus and train - and what used to take me 20 minutes to drive, one journey is now 1 hr and 53 minutes.

      Reply

    • marley says:

      12:00pm | 31/12/10

      If you feel the doctor was wrong, get a second opinion.  If you know in your heart that she was right, though, then you’re going to have to make adjustments.  Maybe move to somewhere closer to the facilities you really need.  And sell the car and use the proceeds for taxis.

    • Ben Anderson says:

      11:43am | 31/12/10

      It took me 11 time to pass my driving test, including one time where I did everything correctly on the road but dinged a parked car when I was pulling into the licensing centre car park.
      Not having my licence until I was 21 turned out to be a blessing because by then I had a full time job and could actually afford a car.

      Reply

    • Charles Kelly says:

      04:30pm | 31/12/10

      The cut-off point should be 5. Quite simply, if you’re so useless that you can’t pass a driving test in 5 attempts, you’re clearly a danger to all those around you and SHOULD NOT be allowed to drive!

    • mary says:

      01:43pm | 31/12/10

      //rather than simply not possessing the ability to drive// That is hard to imagine Leo that you would not possess the ability to drive. As most drivers would agree, there are plenty drivers on the road with licenses and they don’t ‘possess the ability to drive’ by anyones standards. There are also tens of thousands of people on the road without licenses who are very careful and good drivers.

      A license does not make a good driver.

      Reply

    • Chris L says:

      02:37pm | 31/12/10

      Makes the whole licensing idea seem a little redundant.

    • Gerard says:

      05:26pm | 31/12/10

      “Makes the whole licensing idea seem a little redundant.”

      Not for the government and the RTA (and equivalents in other states) which make a huge profit from it.

    • Seano says:

      03:27pm | 31/12/10

      I didn’t learn to drive until we had children which was in my 30s. My excuse was I was the designated drinker. I just never was interested and when I could actually afford it I was living and working in the CBD of a major city either here or over seas.

      Learning to drive though has been one of the best things I ever did. Not only because I don’t have limitations on what I can do with kids but bizzarely for someone who didn’t have an interest in cars I actually really enjoy it.

      Reply

    • XJ says:

      04:59pm | 31/12/10

      Great article. I rushed my license when I was 19, simply because everyone kept asking me when I was going to get it. I only had 40-odd hours practise, and only learnt in an automatic. Got 100% on the test (I had a decent instructor from the RACV), but I wouldn’t recommend doing what I did. Fortunately you need 120 hours in Victoria before you have a crack at the test now.

      The other issue is actually getting a car…I waited another 2 years before I bought one!

      Reply

    • Rose says:

      10:03am | 02/01/11

      If you were 19 when you got your licence there was no rushing involved, you were at least 2 years behind anything that could be remotely considered rushing!!

    • XJ says:

      02:44pm | 02/01/11

      I’d say 40 hours practise was rushing, Rose. Mind, I (now) have a lot of friends in their late 20s only going for their Ps now.

    • not Sue says:

      12:48am | 01/01/11

      My Dear Husband has never driven. He has been a cyclist in the past, but has never bowed to peer pressure on the subject and, to my great relief, rarely asks for chauffeur services since we live very close to public transport. I suggest that you adopt the same atttiude, Leo and accept that you are not destined to be a motorist. There is NO shame in such a decision. except that which you impose upon yourself.
      PS. Since I am the family “designated driver”, he never drinks when I’m expected to drive home. I appreciate the gesture more than I can ever say.

      Reply

    • ron tilbury says:

      06:26pm | 01/01/11

      I am on your side dont bother getting a licence. If you do it implies you want to get a car.
      Cars COST say $20k up front ( or say $30k if bought on finance) car lasts 5 years = $4k/year ( and worth b—- all as a trade-in)
      Insurance say $500 Petrol $50/week= say $2500/year. Maintenance say $500/year .Rego say $500/year Overallcost/year=$8k=$154/week.
      MAATE keep taking cabs and drink fine wine and dont worry.
      ARTIE

      Reply

    • Realist says:

      11:43pm | 01/01/11

      That’s only if you buy a new car. I got my current ride at an unreserved auction and dropped a bit on getting my mechanic to go over it. For about $2600 I got a mid 90’s hatchback with low-km’s that’s in top condition and runs on the smell of an oily rag - I get about 470-500km’s off a 30-litre tank and do about 500km’s a week.

      But then growing up on a farm I’ve been driving since before I was tall enough to reach the pedals without assistance and also hold licenses for boats, motorbikes and heavy rigid trucks and have tickets for forklifts and tractors.

    • I got mine at 17 says:

      10:03am | 07/01/11

      Asan ex short time taxi driver (N owonder with the problems we have driving) an accountant had worked out he was better of finacially without a car. That may be so, but i wonder if he factured in his time delays etc spent waiting, and travelling by cabs and their current cab fare costs? If you want a licence it may pay to go out to the country to get one. No waiting and the tests are more lenient. But dont expect to get one if you dont accept that there is going to be an easy life after getting the licence. You will need to drive with caution, and understand that f you cant see something, you should not go ahead.  Speed is one factor that may get you into trouble and if youre naturally stupid, dont bother….

      Reply
 
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