The Old Coot is being phased out

I’m “unlearning” how to drive. My car, and most cars are well into the process of dumbing us down. I don’t drive something exotic like a self-driving vehicle, yet my car is slowly making my driving skills less and less necessary.

Take the backup camera. It gives me a wide view of what’s behind me, along with markers that tell how close I’m coming to some object. If I keep going, moving closer and closer to the “red” line, it starts a warning beep that would wake up a baby if one were sleeping in the back seat. I don’t have to look in the rearview mirror. I don’t have to look in the side view mirrors. And, best of all, I don’t have to swivel around in the seat and twist my neck to look out the back window. I just stare at the screen on the dash and back away. All my mirror and neck craning skills are ebbing away. 

The same thing is happening with my lane changing skills. My side view mirrors light up if a car is coming along side. Especially, when it enters the blind spot. I don’t have to keep an eye on the traffic behind me, to be aware that someone is coming up on one side or the other. I know the lights on the mirrors will handle that. If I’m not paying attention, and put on my blinker to signal I’m about to change lanes, the side view mirror will yell at me so I won’t crash into the car hidden in my blind spot. My skill at changing lanes is drying up.

My car doesn’t parallel park for me, but some cars do, more and more every year. It will soon become an unnecessary skill. One that new drivers dread, and the single most reason they fail their driving test. I don’t even have to know how or where to insert a key to get in or start my car. I just carry a magic black object in my pocket. It will unlock the door as my hand touches the handle and will start the car when I push a button on the dash that looks like the doorbell button in my first home. When I pull out of the driveway, the car locks the doors, so nobody will accidentally fall out.

It’s insidious, how cars, and so many other devices (bread machines, Keurig coffee makers Roomba Robotic vacuum cleaner and the like) are dumbing down the human species. Forget to fasten your seat belt? The car will nag you until you do. It won’t take long until robots in all shapes and sizes completely take over. I’ll have to ask my car if it will take me for a drive in the country and stand in front of the refrigerator holding out a glass, hoping it will let me have a few cubes of ice. No longer in charge!

Comments, complaints? Send to mlessler7@gmail.com.