Lack of Drive

I don't have, nor have I ever had, a driver's license. I had a driver's permit in high school and passed Driver's Ed (just barely), but never went beyond that.

Most people express surprise, if not outright shock, when I tell them this, at least until I explain that I've lived in Chicago all my life and, therefore, have not needed to own a car. Public transportation here, spotty, dirty and unreliable as it can be, is still fairly comprehensive; there are few parts of the metropolitan area that I can't reach via CTA (city buses and trains) or Metra (suburban trains). And if I need to make a trip requiring a car or truck--say, for large amounts of groceries or furniture from that big suburban store with all the couches and chairs with virtually indecipherable Swedish names--I have plenty of kind, generous friends who will give me a lift to and from my destination.

Of course, this does hamper travel. Not that I travel much--I'm probably the least-traveled person you know (I've never been outside the U.S. and have only gone as far west as Dallas)--but when I do, I'm dependent on friends in the town I'm visiting to get me around. However, those friends usually want to show me around anyway, so this is no big deal.

Increasingly, though, I'm seriously glad that I don't have a license--or, at the very least, that I don't own a car. As I see gas prices punch holes through the ozone layer (this past weekend, I didn't see a single price lower than $4 a gallon), parking rates shoot up, parking availability decrease (especially anywhere near the lakefront) and cell phone use among drivers continue unabated, despite the city's claims that it is vigorously enforcing the cell phone ban, not a week goes by that I'm not nearly run over by some fuckwit babbling away instead of watching where they're going--last weekend, one of the drivers who almost turned me into a rather bulky hood ornament was a Chicago police officer who, presumably, was supposed to be enforcing the law that he was, at that moment, in the process of breaking.

As expensive, irritating and dangerous as driving has become in Chicago, I'm better off walking. The excercise will do me good.