High School: Mr. Chrissinger - Driver’s Ed

Mr. Chrissinger taught teaching Driver’s Education. I spent an hour each day in his class learning about traffic laws, cars and the best places to make out in the area.

As part of our requirements to graduate, we had to take three hours of "driver’s training", which meant we had to actually drive a car for three hours. In Mr. Chrissinger's class, this consisted of three weekends of driving with three students at a time for three hours. Each student drove for one hour each weekend.

Mr. Chrissinger always drove with the boys, and other teachers drove the girls. I kept hoping that I’d be assigned to drive with one of the other teachers, since I didn’t really like Mr. Chrissinger. Of course, I was not only assigned to drive with this man, two of the most abusive boys in the school were assigned to drive with me.

Those three weekends were pure hell for me. First, I had never driven a car before. I think my dad didn’t let me drive for a very good reason - we only had one car, and the family depended on it for our livelihood. So this three hours of driving was the first time I ever sat behind the wheel of a car in my entire life. Naturally I was very nervous, and naturally I made many stupid mistakes.

Of course, the other two boys made sure I suffered for each and every mistake. They teased me mercilessly, starting as soon as I got in the car and not ending until I was dropped off at home. They’d tease me about the way I made a left turn, about the time I forgot to signal, about my lack of knowledge of the operation of the car.

One of the boys noticed I had a small wart on my upper lip. He spent the first three hours of our driving time telling everyone how gross it looked, about how it made him want to throw up. For one of the few times in my life, someone was actually able to make me feel self-conscious about my looks. He made me feel so bad that I actually took a razor blade and cut the wart off myself rather than put up with another three hours of merciless teasing. Of course, the next time he simply found something else to tease me about.

Like the time we stopped for gas at a gas station. Since I was driving, Mr. Chrissinger asked me to step out and fill up the tank with gasoline. I’d never done this before, so I wasn't sure how to do it.

I grabbed one of the hoses and tried to put it in the gas intake. The nozzle was too large. I tried to force it in, but it would fit. Rather than admitting my ignorance, I simply began pumping gas. After I had pumped in about a dollars worth, Mr. Chrissinger noticed I was pumping leaded gas into an unleaded car. He screamed at me to stop, and finished pumping the gas himself. I heard about that for months afterwards.

I was also teased mercilessly for getting stopped by a policeman - for going too slow. The officer was very nice. He understood that I was a student driver. he merely wanted to impress upon me the need to keep up with traffic - especially when driving in the fast lane on the freeway.

I probably did just about everything wrong. I turned left from the far right lane, and I turned right from the left lane. I used the wrong turn signals, and I went through several red lights. I drove too slow, I drove too fast. I changed lanes in front of a big truck, scaring the hell out of everyone. Someone changed lanes in front of me, almost forcing me off the road. And I couldn’t parallel park at all - I simply gave up on that one.

By the time those three weekends were over, I never wanted to see a car again as long as I lived. I got over it, however, because my father began letting me drive the family car for short distances. Within a couple of years, I had a drivers license, and I soon purchased my own car.

I got sweet revenge with those two boys who shared those three weekends with me. As it turned out, they had both signed up for a class in which I served as the teachers aide. This meant I helped the teacher by grading tests, reading papers and watching the students when he was away. By the end of that semester, those two students really learned to regret how they treated me … I made them go through hell and back to get a barely passing grade. Sometimes, revenge can be sweet.