The Third Time Is the Charm

Logan Marraro

Mrs. Watkins

English III AP

October 23, 2016

The Third Time is the Charm

        I am not a coach, nor do I understand the acute points of instruction necessary to be one. However, one thing I know and strongly believe in is that practice is a key ingredient for success. The repetition and experience gained from training will benefit your performance in life’s various tests.

        On my sixteenth birthday, I was given one of these “tests”. The practice began exactly one year prior to that when I walked out of the New Braunfels DMV with my new driving permit. I just turned fifteen, got my permit, and was eager to get on the road. I figured that by the time I was sixteen, I would ace the driving skills exam and have my license my sophomore year. That was the goal.

        The driver’s education course was a cost-effective, online class. You did the classroom lessons online and practiced with a parent driver. Although, when it came down to practicing, I came up short. I would practice driving maybe once or twice every two weeks and continued the classroom portion of the driver’s education. The occasional driving practices helped me gain a mediocre sense of the road, but I didn’t get nearly the amount of experience I ought to have. It was only days before the driving skills test did I begin to train as often as possible. The rushed practice and neglect of fundamentals was all I had gotten out of a whole year’s worth of time. And it was no one’s fault but my own because of my procrastination.

        On the day of testing, all of these factors were evident in my performance. My test came to an abrupt end when I backed straight over a curb. The lady judging my skills unsympathetically told me to park the car and reschedule another test once I was prepared. After that I immediately scheduled another skills test for a date twenty days later at a different DMV. I practiced a bit more and waited for my next exam. The second test was no better than the first. Long story short, I failed to properly yield and failed again. This time, I wasn’t quick to blame the DMV or judge for my shortcoming. I knew it was my fault for not training.