Any parent who drives will tell you that ferrying offspring has played a crucial part in their relationship with them. Now we are at the stage of being in the passenger seat as The Teenager practices driving, I have been reflecting on 17 years as a chauffeur.
The first drive was of course the 10-mile-an-hour journey from the hospital, with Mr P at the wheel, white-knuckled and braced for any opportunity to defend and protect his precious cargo. Meanwhile, I was astonished that everyone was going about their business and was rather disappointed at the lack of crowds on the pavement, cheering and waving flags as we passed by.
Mr P was called into action over many nights in the following few months to strap The Baby in the car seat in the middle of the night and drive for as long as it took for her to fall asleep after I had begun hallucinating from exhaustion.
There were then the interminable journeys with the soundtrack of the most annoying CDs ever invented, designed to delight small children and drive their parents to drink.
Journeys to school then provided a brief respite from the constant hectoring to GET A MOVE ON. That moment when you’re in the car and it’s too late for anything you may have forgotten, with the radio burbling away, was a welcome relief for all concerned.
Later, the radio would mysteriously change from Radio 2 or 4 to 1 whenever I left the car. We spent years taking turns at the CD player, resulting in me being word perfect on many Busted, McFly and SClub 7 tracks and her fluent in the Clash, David Bowie and the Jam.
Then the journeys to sports and activities provided an ideal opportunity to talk without looking at each other – the ideal position for when something was troubling her.
And now I am becoming used to sitting on the wrong side of the car, trying not to jump every few seconds, wondering where those 17 years went.