It was an aberrantly cold morning of Dusshera Festival in October, Sun was rising in the sky and struggling hard to look inside the house. Mom was done with shouting my name from kitchen 337 times, and Mau was learning how to make a wreath of correct shape for every vehicle and an Arch of flower for the entrance. Every Indian festival creates a healthy, blissful and energetic ambiance in the house enhancing the creativity of all the members through the decorations. After 338th shout, Mom came and snatched the phone from my hands vehemently, and told me to go and start cleaning the vehicles as we are planning to start with the Ayudh Puja soon. It is a traditional ritual of Navratri which basically means the Worship of Instruments. So I took all the vehicle keys, a bucket, a cloth and finally went to the parking. As I was making my way out of the wet parking lot where at least one member from every house of the society was cleaning their vehicles, I realized that I’m little late to come here, as most of the space was occupied. So now I have to move the two-wheeler out from where it was parked, take it to a new location to clean it neatly. After moving it out and cleaning it, I decided to clean the Four Wheeler. Cleaning a four-wheeler is much easier than cleaning a two-wheeler because the dust muddled between the spokes, fins of the engine also near the chain agonized the work.
As soon as I started cleaning the dust on the windshield, the quirky thought of starting the vehicle came into my mind. I had just completed 18th birthday and had no experience of sitting at the driver’s seat. The idea of driving the car has always fascinated me. The thoughts of starting a vehicle and shifting the first gear started flooding my mind albeit I was trying my best to avoid them, as I had no experience of doing it before. I tried to focus on cleaning the vehicle neatly. But finally, after a long struggle with thoughts, I courageously started the vehicle and shifted the first gear by pressing the clutch pedal tightly. By this time the next thought of releasing the handbrakes had already started acquiring my mind. In this ambiguous situation, I stopped the engine and restarted it a couple of times to practice the movement of the lever to shift the 1st gear. I practiced it a couple of times and then unexpectedly released the handbrake and the moment I realized, what I did I was already shivering. I stopped the engine immediately.
I got up from the driver seat and moved to clean the rest of the car. But now I got the confidence that I can at least shift the 1st gear. Thinking about it deeply and feeling excited for a few minutes, my mind gave me the next task of releasing the clutch and get the vehicle moving. Well, I was shivering by the thought itself so I tried to dump it. It was the first time I faced the ambiguous situation of Mind vs Mind. But also I was wondering if I can try to release the clutch? Well, I knew how to drive the motorcycle and how the clutch works, so I decided to take the step forward by releasing the clutch and get the vehicle moving. As soon I tried to release the pedal, I got a jerk and engine-turned off, I understood what had happened. On the second trial, I managed to avoid the jerk by slowly realizing the clutch and BANG! It actually moved a bit, although I was shivering to infinity I got the vehicle moving. I was very excited about what I did and actually stepped out of the vehicle to see how much of it has actually moved? After noticing I realized that I would not be able to move it any further or else my father will notice that I tried to drive it without any guidance. So, I started pushing the vehicle backward by keeping the steering straight, because I wanted to release the clutch again. Such heavenly fulfilling feeling it was. I had to push the car back because I was shit scared to use the reverse gear. I repeated this process of releasing the clutch and pushing the car backward a couple of times. But at one of my attempt when I was about to release the clutch pedal, someone knocked the window!! The heartbeat skipped, it was my sister who came to call me as a lot of time had slipped in the experiments of driving the car. I opened the window with a freaking smile on my face. She asked “Can you drive? I’m going to tell Papa about this better you come with me now, “I asked her to come in, and explained how I explored the things. The next sentence she said was “Let’s take the car to the gate, I will guide you, from a shotgun”. I was shocked by her trust. She is 5yrs younger than me and had full trust in the brother who had just learned to shift the first gear. Oh, little beautiful sister! I was overwhelmed by her expressions and cuteness together.
I took it as a challenge and after a couple of rehearsals of releasing the clutch, I finally moved the vehicle from the parking lot till the gate from the back side of the building and came back safely. During the entire journey, she kept guiding me without wearing the seat belt. After this incident, there was no limit to how much we practiced together until I started feeling confident about driving.
One day while we were practicing in the society, mom showed up suddenly. We were caught. Mom was gazing angrily and asked me to park the vehicle instantly, both of us were ready for her rebuke and anger. She scolded me and even her and took the only key we had and kept it with her. After that our driving sessions ended for a while as my college started and I moved to Mumbai. One day, Mau called me telling a good news that she had found the spare key of the four-wheeler and have secluded it from mom and dad. I ran to Pune on the very next long weekend and, yes! The sessions were started again. I quickly learned to drive on second gear and on the slope with the half clutch. She gave me the baleful warning that if I ever try to drive the vehicle without her or ever try to fight with her, then I would lose the key. Such an innocent warning it was. She could have asked for anything for secluding the key but she is very innocent and cute. After that, I got a full confidence on driving and got a permission to drive as well. But I’ll never be able to drive without remembering the innocent little Driving Teacher to whom I’m actually going to teach how to drive in next couple of months.
-Rigved Hattekar.
Rugved Hattekar 