You will Go Where Your Steering Wheel Points

I am the youngest child in my family, so by the time it was my turn to learn to drive my parents were all but ready to just hand over the car keys. With three kids as swimmers, they’d had enough of the early morning drives to practice and the long weekend days spent at meets. I have a summer birthday, so I was also one of the last among my friends to get my license. I was eager to drive but I was a little low on practice when my mom rewarded my first Junior-year report card with her approval to get my license. In the state of Texas, all you need is a parent’s signature that you’ve completed the required hours of practice behind the wheel and a passed written test to get your license. No actual driving test required.  

So I was within reach of getting my actual license mostly because I was a decent student and my mom was tired of driving me everywhere. On a particular day of practice driving with my Dad, we were approaching an intersection very near our house when I started to drift from my lane. Something distracted me, caught my attention, and I stopped watching the cars in front of me. My dad hollered (if you know him, you know how rare this is), and I quickly came to a stop at the red light in front of us. As you know, things like this happen in a matter of splits of seconds so the order of events is a little jumbled in my memory. Regardless, the events that followed were not lost on me.

My dad RARELY gets worked up, and when I say “rarely” I mean I think I have heard him raise his voice (literally have never heard him actually yell) less than a handful of times in my entire life. The worst word I have EVER heard him say is “crap.” In fact, this moment is the only time I can specifically recall him raising his voice to me.

As I was saying, I brought the car to an abrupt stop. I’m sure my dad was slamming on imaginary breaks on the right-hand side of the car. The car stopped, I looked at my dad, and immediately tears welled up in my eyes. I knew he was upset. He said (in his stern but not particularly loud voice), “Meg, what you are driving is a WEAPON. You cannot forget that. You will drive where you’re looking, and you will go where your steering wheel points.”  

I recall this moment so clearly. It has stuck with me for nearly two decades now, and I think that singular moment made me a better driver. We have so many distractions in our lives now. I don’t know about y’all, but my steering wheel is losing its power steering this year. The media is hollering at us, and now we have obligations and societal structures that are making it harder to remember where we want to steer our lives.  It’s getting a bit loud out here, right? I hope I’m not alone in feeling like the noise is making it hard for me to focus. I forget where I’m looking. I forget where I was steering.

There’s something about the fall that helps me recenter myself. It’s my favorite season for so many reasons, and I love that the leaves change just before they fall. It’s like a reminder that there’s still time to change. And even a small change in the trees brings the most beautiful colors we see all year.

Did you have a goal for 2020? How about a special prayer or area of focus? Are you someone who likes to set intentions for the day, week, month, year? I’m trying to recall my intension for 2020. There are about 90 days left in the year. With all that’s happening in the world, I just want us to remember that we’re driving where our steering wheel is pointed. Make sure yours is pointed towards the intention that matters most to your heart.  

“T21 Trucking” was named for our daughter, Regan who has Down syndrome (also called Trisomy21 or T21.)