Tour Guide or Driver?: Near Death in Carife, Italy
My dad is arguably one of the worst drivers that I have ever seen in my life. He is jerky, clumsy, drives too fast and races with guys 20 years his junior and loses all the time. He is the type of driver who puts his car in reverse, but acts like it is going forward and vice versa. This is the same guy who destroyed our bikes as children in the garage by stepping on the gas instead of parking the car. To top it all off he has this peculiar habit of acting like a tour guide while he is driving, putting the lives of his passengers in jeopardy. This proclivity might be nice if you are driving in slow moving New York City traffic, but doing this in the middle of the serpentine turns of Carife, Italy not a good idea...This is where my brothers and I almost lost our lives because of some damned orange tree...
I remember it like yesterday, the year was 2000. We were all excited because we were about to visit our beloved aunt Camilla. The weather was perfect, a dry, forgiving air hit our faces as we kept our windows open. My father during the drive took it upon himself to navigate his life story while he was driving. Generally not a good idea for anyone, but given my father's illustrious past even worse. For each landmark that reminded him of his childhood he would point suddenly and tell us such things, "I walked 5 miles each day to learn my trade," or even better, " You young people have it too easy." It seemed like for each landmark we were always breaking to hear some historical fact about my father's past. After doing this for about a zillion times my father then proceeded to excitedly say, "Look, Look! that is the tree where I climbed and got my oranges!." While he was pointing our car began swerving to the left as we approached a curve. We almost collided head on with the car on the opposite side of the road. We yelled at my father and fortunately he was able to adjust his car just in time to avoid the fatal head on collision. We all collectively gasped while at the same time we inwardly cursed that freakin orange tree. The drive was only supposed to take 15 minutes, but to us it felt like an eternity.
I remember it like yesterday, the year was 2000. We were all excited because we were about to visit our beloved aunt Camilla. The weather was perfect, a dry, forgiving air hit our faces as we kept our windows open. My father during the drive took it upon himself to navigate his life story while he was driving. Generally not a good idea for anyone, but given my father's illustrious past even worse. For each landmark that reminded him of his childhood he would point suddenly and tell us such things, "I walked 5 miles each day to learn my trade," or even better, " You young people have it too easy." It seemed like for each landmark we were always breaking to hear some historical fact about my father's past. After doing this for about a zillion times my father then proceeded to excitedly say, "Look, Look! that is the tree where I climbed and got my oranges!." While he was pointing our car began swerving to the left as we approached a curve. We almost collided head on with the car on the opposite side of the road. We yelled at my father and fortunately he was able to adjust his car just in time to avoid the fatal head on collision. We all collectively gasped while at the same time we inwardly cursed that freakin orange tree. The drive was only supposed to take 15 minutes, but to us it felt like an eternity.
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