The Safe Driver

Which rules do you follow?

Raising my kids has been an adventure. They’re all old enough to recognize good from evil; most of the time. They will also tend to do a lot of things they see me do. You know the saying; monkey see – monkey do. Do you think kids will copy the bad things you do? I believe they will.

The other morning while driving to my office, I came up to an all-way stop at a T-intersection. After stopping, I scanned the intersection to see if it was clear before making a left turn. Coming from my right side at the top of the T was an adult cyclist. I had stopped for a few seconds before they arrived so you would think they would have slowed down. They didn’t and kept going through the intersection at full speed; the same direction that I was heading.

You would have thought that because they were an adult that they would have at least slowed down enough to see what I was doing before proceeding through the intersection. If I was a typical driver, I may have just ignored this cyclist because I was there first and continued to my left. I may have knocked them off their bike and they could have been injured… or worse.

As a driver, we need to stay in an adult state of mind. This means to think logically, responsibly and use mature thoughts. If we saw our kids ride their bike through a stop sign, especially when a vehicle was already there, wouldn’t you punish your kids? Maybe take their bike away from them for a certain period of time. An adult state of mind tells us that a vehicle can hurt us if we’re not thinking responsibly while riding a bike, walking and driving.

How would you explain to your kids that it was okay for you to ride through a stop sign on your bike? Wouldn’t you be angry at them for doing the same thing? How would you explain to your kids how you got injured on your bike because you went through a stop sign when another vehicle was going through at the same time? How would your family cope if you were killed doing this?

After seeing this adult cyclist go through the intersection, I wasn’t really shocked. I was mainly disappointed with their actions. We need to have the same rules for us as we have for our kids. After all, no one wants to be told by our own kids that we screwed up big time.