There was a film that came out in 1989 with Morgan Freeman, Jessica Tandy and Dan Aykroyd being the key cast members entitled Driving Miss Daisy. It’s a story of a son (Dan Aykroyd) recognizing that his mother (Jessica Tandy) needed to quit driving and hired a driver (Morgan Freeman) to drive her around. It was filmed in the deep south with the factions of black and white being in play. Driving Miss Daisy centered on Morgan and Jessica coming together to become best friends.
I bring this movie to mind, because my kids and in particular Carter think that I drive like an old man (Miss Daisy). Mind you, I haven’t always been like this. I am known for driving fast and getting speeding tickets, but more recently getting out of speeding tickets as in my most recent episode. I was driving up to Flagstaff with my dog Monty when a policeman stopped me for driving too fast in a work zone. He approached me from the passenger side and saw Monty, my Cavalier King Charles spaniel, sitting in the passenger seat.
Before we knew it, we were talking about dogs and he finished by saying, just watch your speed and let me go–without a ticket or a warning. But I digress.
My wife and I over the last few months bought a four-door pick-up truck. On the speed-o-meter is a reading that gives you miles per gallon (mpg) reading and I have become fascinated to increase that number as I drive. That means that I have to slow down when I am driving, and slowly accelerate when I go from a stopping position. Trucks notoriously get bad gas mileage, but I am getting 16-17 miles per gallon even when I am driving in town and more on the road.
When I talked to my son Carter about this, he brushed me off, because he drives like I used to and gets poor gas mileage on his vehicle–and could care less about his gas mileage. He could care less about the gas he was using to accelerate until today.
I was driving with him as he took me to pick up my truck and I so happened to look over at his gauges. The mpg said 17.4 and I said, “Carter what’s going on with your mpg?!!! Are you driving differently?!!! Are you beginning to drive like your dad?!!!” I began to laugh uncontrollably as I realized he was beginning to copy his dad in his most recent pattern of driving (driving LIKE Miss Daisy).
On this journey, you never know who is watching you in terms of your patterns of behavior. Just because they make fun of something you are doing, you are always planting seeds in the next generation and you never know when or where that seed you planted may germinate. Happy planting.
