Those first months, I took the shuttle bus to my new job at the college every day. The shuttle was also how I got to the grocery store. It made me feel like one of the college kids, not at all like the independent woman I fancied myself. But I knew this was temporary, and I quickly bought a package of ten driving lessons and took them weekly during my lunch break. They were a welcome break from my dull new job. My instructor Joe was a kind-hearted retired Italian-American, incidentally born and raised in Williamsburg, the neighborhood I had lived with my family before the separation. One Wednesday afternoon about three lessons in, he drove his burgundy-colored Ford Taurus to my office as usual. As I walked onto the parking lot, Joe got out of the driver’s seat, and walked around the car to the passenger side.
“How ya doin’, Anita?”
“Good! How about you, Joe?” Sliding into the driver seat I put on my seatbelt, ready to go.
Once he sat down next to me, he said, “I thought I’d have you try and go out on the open road today. What d’ya think?”
“Really? Okay.”
“I think you’re ready,” he said. “Let’s go. Take a right out of the parking lot.”
Up until now, Joe had always instructed me to take a left out of the parking lot, toward campus. The speed limit was twenty-five miles an hour, and there was this perfect, nearly deserted straight bit of road where he had me practice driving in reverse. But on this day, I turned right, away from campus and into the world.
River Road is an iconic Hudson Valley road that winds, loosely following the Hudson River. It’s lined with historic estates and is hugged on both sides by gorgeous old trees that turn breathtaking autumn colors in October. I had been on this road many times, mostly in taxis on my way to the train station and riding in Zipcars with my boyfriend on our weekend trips upstate. But driving this road on my own was a new experience. It was like driving through an enchanted tunnel of yellow, orange and chartreuse, like driving through a Hudson River School painting. I felt like I was flying.
Meanwhile, Joe was reminiscing about Williamsburg.
“You know, I’ve been thinking about my old neighborhood, since you told me you used to live there.”
“Oh yeah?” I said, turning briefly to face him.
“Yeah, this morning, I remembered the bakery my mom used to send me for bagels every Sunday.”
“That one on Grand?” I asked.
“Yeah! You know it?”
“I lived across the street from there!” I said, turning to face him again, the bushy eyebrows on his face rising, a sentimental smile underneath his pronounced hooked nose.
“Ah man, I can still smell those bagels when they baked them early in the mornin,’” he said.
We were both quiet for a moment.
“You know how every time I talk to you, you turn your head to face me? You can’t do that.”
“Oh yeah, sorry, I keep forgetting.” I said, shaking my head.
“When you’re the driver, you gotta keep your eyes on the road.”
“Right, got it.”
When I asked Joe how he got to be a driving instructor, he told me that he taught all four of his kids. I agreed with them that he was a natural at it, and he decided it was as a decent a gig as any after retirement. Under his patient guidance, I picked up the skill quickly, and Joe promised I’d have my driver’s license in hand before the first snow of the season. After my ten lessons were up, I was ready to do this thing and made the appointment for my road test without consulting Joe first.
“You’re doing your road test in Kingston?” he asked during our last lesson.
“Yeah, why?” I asked.
“Well, you’ve never driven there. It would have been better to do the road test where you’re familiar with the streets.”
It was a good point. Impatient and overly confident, I had just taken the first available opening.
But Joe drove me to Kingston anyway, on the other side of the Hudson River, and I passed the road test by the skin of my teeth.
Apparently, I had been very unlucky with the examiner, “the meanest of them all,” according to Joe. He had been careful not to say anything when I was first assigned, not wanting to make me more nervous than I already was. Now I understood why he had been so finicky when we were sitting in his car waiting my turn. Come to think of it, the examiner had been a bit of a jerk, a large man, unnecessarily intimidating and barking his instructions at me the entire time. He made me nervous, and I messed up a lot, but the one thing I did ace was my parallel parking and truly only that. I believe that in the end, the decision to pass me was purely one of pity. A New Yorker himself, when the examiner found out I was a single mom new to the countryside, he softened considerably and marveled at how I had been managing getting to the grocery store ‘and everything else.’
“Must have been hell,” he mumbled.
In the end, I guess he wasn’t such a bad guy after all.
Exhaling with relief, I stepped out of the examiner’s car and I walked up to the Taurus, where Joe started quickly rolling down the window. I couldn’t quite make out his facial expression. Something told me he was expecting bad news.
“I did it, Joe!”
Joe’s face changed from tense anticipation to a deep sense of relief.
“Oh, thank GOD you passed. Oh, thank GOD!” he said over and over in his thick Brooklyn accent. He practically kissed me on the mouth. It wasn’t until after I told him the good news that I realized he had been at least as nervous as I had been the whole time he was waiting for me.
Joe excitedly held up his car key, suggesting I drive his car back home, but I was still shaky.
“Do you mind driving me back one more time, Joe?” I asked.
“Oh, sure. But let me buy you a cup of coffee first at my favorite Italian bakery—to celebrate.”
Paper cups of coffee in hand, Joe and I once more crossed the Hudson River. Through the passenger window, I saw tiny snowflakes starting to come down. He had kept his promise.