Gear It In Gear

My son has been driving for a mere three months now but he learned on an automatic transmission. He is a good driver and a good kid so when he asked to trade in his ''granny car'' for one more befitting to a sixteen year old boy I had to think about it long and hard. With gas prices having such unpredictable mood swings switching to a more economical car might not be a bad idea. Having a smaller car might be easier to navigate in Omaha's traffic as well as parking lots.

The granny car was rather large and boatish so when an opportunity came up to buy a friend's car who was in the service and deploying to another country I told my son if he could sell his granny car then he could buy the sporty little car. His eyes lit up and he immediately got into high gear. He made flyers and posted them around town then he took pictures of his car and made a posting on Craigslist putting it up for sale. The granny car sold quickly and before our friend was ready to release the ownership of his car so my son used that time to read about stick shifts on the internet and watch You Tube videos on how to drive a stick.

I was skeptical and thought we were still going to have at least a week of frustrating, lurching, engine killing lessons. I was wrong. Sure he killed the engine a few times (five, but who is counting?) but withing two days my son was confidently on the road in a five speed Mitsubishi.

I am pretty impressed with how much he learned before he got behind the wheel and I think we are both very pleased with how it paid off.