I was determined to get my driver’s license on the very day I turned sixteen, just like my two older brothers had before me. In 1965, you could take the written test and receive your temporary license, then return seven days later to test for your driver’s license. That unbearable one-week wait had only recently been added to the Ohio Code of Motor Vehicles. To further add insult to injury, my brothers had been able to take their temporary test and their driver’s test on the same day. (“What about driver’s ed?” you ask. Driver’s Education had just found its way into my sophomore high school curriculum and, although it was recommended, it wasn’t yet mandatory.)
I asked Mom what it was like when she took her driver’s test and was flabbergasted when she said, “You didn’t need a drivers’ license! Anyone could drive a car until later, when the state determined to license drivers. But even then, you simply registered at the court house and they handed you a license.” She went on to add,” I’ve never taken a driver’s test.”
She and Dad looked forward to us boys getting our licenses for the freedom it brought not to us, but to them. We lived “way out in the country,” and both Mom and Dad worked into the evening. They simply weren’t available to cart us back and forth to extra-curricular activities. Until we could drive ourselves, we had to find a ride home or wait late into the evening until Dad was available to pick us up. I recall many evenings, waiting alone, propped against a light pole in front of the school. I felt like a total dweeb. I’m still a little traumatized by those dark, winter evenings… even idyllic Sugar Grove becomes a spooky place at night to a skinny 7th grader.
It’s funny, really, recalling how comforting it was to see Dad pull up in our family wagon. Funny because at any other time—if my friends had been there with me—I would have been embarrassed at the sight of Dad wearing his milkman hat and driving our decades-old station wagon. I longed to be from a cooler family… you know, like the kids who lived in a subdivision with paved streets. Their parents drove newer, cleaner cars with white wall tires. It was obvious we were not from the upper crust. Our crust was rusted with dust covering every surface of the old wagon, including an ever-present layer completely blocking the rear glass.
Dad ignored my complaints about our dirty car. He’d quip, “We get to take a little of our farm with us wherever we go.” On those lonely nights I found he was right because, with no one there to impress, my heart always warmed at the sight of that gracious man and his dusty station wagon. It felt like my home had come to pick me up. Like our old family dog, I had history with that wagon. Its familiar sound and humble demeanor comforted me. Today, those memories are a powerful symbol of the incredible security I enjoyed as a youngster. As I slid into the front seat beside Marvin the Milkman, I was just as good as home. I’d give a year’s salary to catch even a glimpse of Dad in that mud green station wagon today.
Reflecting on yesterday helps me keep my perspective. Admittedly, that dust encrusted wagon would look like a sway back horse at the Kentucky Derby if parked beside today’s minivan. But to me, it’s importance wasn’t in its appearance: it was in its essence. It felt like home to me.
The Bible says we are actually traveling through this life on our way to a better home. We want to fit in like the cool kids, but we know deep within we belong to something more important than our present surroundings. We were made by God to be His people and He promises to someday come pick us up.
“Don’t let this throw you. You trust God, don’t you? Trust me. There is plenty of room for you in my Father’s home. If that weren’t so, would I have told you that I’m on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I’m on my way to get your room ready, I’ll come back and get you so you can live where I live. And you already know the road I’m taking.” John 14:1-4 The Message
When we see Him round the corner, we will cast aside our cares and our self importance and finally feel “at home.” Don’t be surprised if He’s driving a dusty old station wagon.
Read Ron’s column, Simple Faith, each Saturday on the Faith Page (page 3) of the Lancaster Eagle Gazette, or visit www.lancastereaglegazette.com.