Just A Gal From Glidden: Freedom at 16 and 202 kilometres of trouble

By Kate Winquist

July 2, 1985.

That date is burned into my memory. I had just turned 16 a month earlier and, yes, that was the historic day Katie Drummond got her driver’s licence. Freedom at last.

Well… eventually.

I’ll admit it. I didn’t pass my driver’s test on the first try. Nerves got the better of me. I practiced and practiced my parallel parking out at the farm. Dad even set up a mock sidewalk with some lumber, with his 1966 Mercury parked ahead so I could practice squeezing in beside it. I could do a three-point turn like nobody’s business and I walked into that test feeling pretty confident.

Everything went fine at first. I lost two points for stopping a bit too far into a crosswalk. Not ideal, but not the end of the world.

Then we hit Main Street in Kindersley.

And that’s when my brain completely checked out.

Without thinking, I made a left turn on a red light.

I still remember the instructor blurting out, “What are you doing, woman?”

“Uh… uh… uh… I don’t know!”

Instant fail.

Maybe traffic was light that day, but for whatever reason I had a full-blown brain freeze. I slunk back into KCS afterward and sulked at my desk, convinced my driving career had ended before it even started.

Mind you, things could have been worse. I had a friend who didn’t even make it out of the Provincial building parking lot before failing. She backed into a parked car before the test had properly begun.

So really, I suppose I was doing alright.

For my next attempt, I booked the exam in Leader. I simply could not bring myself to face that same instructor in Kindersley again. Thankfully, a different town and a different examiner gave me a different outcome. I passed, with only a two-point deduction.

You guessed it.

Stopping too far into a crosswalk.

Back then, getting your licence meant one thing: cruising. Everyone wanted to be one of the cool kids driving endless laps up and down Kindersley’s Main Street. You’d head down Main, turn left at the Prairie Trail Hotel, another left past the old L.B. store, left again by the Downtowner Motel and then back onto Main. You’d keep going until the Gulf station, flip around and head back the other direction.

Lap after lap.

You’d wave at the same vehicles every time you passed them and occasionally pull over to find out where the party was that night.

Being the youngest of the Drummond clan, I’ll admit I was probably a little spoiled. By that time my siblings had graduated and moved on, so I was the only one left at home.

Then in 1986 Dad bought a brand-new GMC Wrangler. Two-tone blue. And it had a cassette player.

That cassette player felt like luxury.

Cruising in a new truck while listening to my mixed tapes. I was living the dream.

One day Mom and Dad had to go to Saskatoon to pick up my sister Pam at the airport. I stayed home alone at the farm.

Which is when I had what I thought was a brilliant idea.

Why not hop in the truck, drive into town, pick up a couple of girlfriends and cruise around for a bit? Mom and Dad would never know. I’d be home long before they returned. All I had to do was fill with gas from the farm fuel tank, park the truck back in the garage and sit there innocently reading a book when they walked in.

Perfect plan.

Except for one small problem.

Pam’s flight was delayed.

Mom tried calling home to let me know. No answer. Eventually she called one of my friend’s houses.

“Is Katie there?”

Why yes. Yes, she was.

At that moment I knew the jig was up.

So we wrapped up our cruising tour of Kindersley and I headed back to the farm.

Mom and Dad got home quite late that night with Pam. Surprisingly, I didn’t get much of a lecture. Dad even said he knew I was a pretty good driver and generally responsible.

I thought I had gotten away with it.

Until the next morning.

Dad was standing there looking at the truck.

“You drove 202 kilometres yesterday?! What the hell were you doing?”

That sinking feeling hit my stomach instantly. The same feeling I had when the driver examiner barked at me for that infamous red-light turn.

How was I supposed to know Dad had written down the odometer reading before they left?

Fatherly intuition, I suppose.

And maybe that was the lesson.

When you’re 16, freedom feels like the open road and a full tank of gas. But life has a funny way of reminding you that someone is always paying attention to the mileage you’re putting on things - especially your Dad.