The drugs don't work, they only make it worse

My name is Prom Queen and it is exactly 12 weeks and two days since I last owned a working car. I am not a Thatcherite failure but a woman tackling an addiction.

I am serious. This is not a joke or a cheap shot at addicts. Like the majority of adults I had become addicted to the car. I thought I could not manage without it. It cost me a lot of money and it was doing me no good. True, it was helpful to get me to work and back, the kids to clubs and back, and the whole family away (and back) for weekends and holidays, but there were definite health drawbacks.

OK, my and the majority of other adults’ addiction to driving is not as destructive to us and our families and friends as heroin, crack or alcohol, say, even though vehicles may be as life-threatening as drugs if the following statistics are to be believed:

There are about 9,000 deaths from alcohol a year in the UK (other estimates put it at 40,000 though it depends what you count as alcohol-related), 114,000 people die from tobacco-related disease, and drugs kill something in the region of 3,000 people which is roughly the same number as are killed in traffic accidents. So smoking is a lot more dangerous than drinking, drug-taking or getting into a car. Of course this begs the question of why tobacco is legal, even why alcohol is legal and other drugs are not, but that’s for another time. As it is, it would seem that cars are not beneficial to health and safety. Amazing Britain allows them really.

But this isn’t the main thing I am thinking about. Yes, when I get in a car I am at risk, and if I walk rather than drive I am healthier (as long as I’m not knocked down by car, that is). But give your average adult a car and they will use it excessively, embracing new hobbies and ‘just popping to the shops’, because they can. I've read that the average person in the UK spends 90 minutes a day travelling, most of it by car, while those without cars spend less time (87 minutes) even though they can't whizz places at great speed.

Take my good friend A ( who picks me and my children up when we get stuck so I am hugely grateful and hope she doesn’t kick the car habit). She emailed me to say: “So far this morning I have taken R (elder son) to cricket then R (younger son) to football, dashed to Sainsbury's then home to unpack to football to cricket then into town! If I had no car I would had done internet shopping and read a book.”

Exactly. Since I have had no car I have rushed around less. Is that a good thing? It means that our wings have been a little clipped. Timetables must be studied, journeys have to be planned, and sometimes abandoned. Last Tuesday, for example, I should have been going to the theatre to review a play as part of my job, but, because my lift fell through, I stayed at home and someone else saw what was apparently an entertaining whodunit. It was a shame but I watched TV with the children instead which was good for our relationship, and I didn’t have to write the review.  I have not been able to drive other people around and this, selfishly, continues to be a huge relief (and has meant that those regular passengers have had to become more self-reliant so that is probably good. Yes Ted, you are 14 and have legs, school is a mile away - walk!). And we all hark on about the ‘good old days’ when life was simpler. Give up the car and life can be simpler if you choose that it should be, as long as you can get to the places you really need to reach.

There remain some problems - mainly Monday and Tuesday nights when Ted and Lexy have drama classes, and those days when I must take some of our eccentrically large number of cats to the vet. If we ever need an emergency trip to a doctor with one of the children, we will take a taxi but I can’t bring myself to do this simply to escort three solid toms (aka ‘The Brothers’) to the vet for routine immunisations. Instead, Boris’s Dad helped with the vet run today and has promised to come back next week if I can capture the one tom who savaged me with his claws before leaping on top of a neighbour’s garage from where he watched me with a mix of caution and disdain. Drama remains a challenge and I am hugely grateful to A for doing more dashing around and rescuing Lexy last week.

So should I clip the children’s wings further and tell them they have to stop drama? That would seem wrong. The classes are fun. Lexy and Ted are enthusiastic about them and seem to benefit from them. Why should they be penalised for our decision not to have a car? And let's face it, the Younger and Elder Rs would not be able to do their cricket, football and other sports (see below) without the use of a car and would probably interrupt their mother's reading!

We don’t yet have the money for a new car, but we probably have the credit so we could buy one. People with neither money nor credit must make do with feet, bikes and public transport. They probably don’t start attending drama classes in the first place unless there is somewhere within easy reach. I watched a TV programme in which the head of an inner-city primary school and the head of one of the top state junior schools in the country swapped places. One day, the inner-city head was talking to a charming little boy from the high-performing junior school. He told her that he went to drama classes outside school. The head was taken aback. That wasn’t an opportunity her regular children had. Her own school was nowhere near as successful as the one she was visiting.

High-achievement at school is closely linked to opportunity and parental support. The former, and to an extent the latter, is closely linked to economics. That should not be the case. But while society is addicted to cars and while there is no meaningful investment in public transport, nor in providing decent local classes and facilities, it is hard to see how that will change.

PS A’s dashing around is paying off. Congratulations to the elder R for winning the Waterlooville Junior Open. You worked hard and are clearly talented. But without your mum or dad’s car you would not have got so good at golf.

Lift off or let down?

So why on earth am I actually considering living without a car? And what do I mean by the fact that that first 10 days carless days haven't’t gone too badly? Quite apart from the cancelled visits, I have had to walk to school each day (only 10-15 minutes but about three in the car and I find getting up in the morning a bit of a challenge) and we have only just made it. I have had to let down two friends, one of whom needed a lift (to a place that I too wanted to visit) and the other of whom needed something picked up from a nearby town. I have had to wait for late buses and struggle back with heavy shopping, dash from bus stop to school and then there was the problem of Tuesday evening.

Tuesday evenings are a logistical challenge even with a car, involving getting home from work in time to take eldest son to a drama class (“why are you late Mum, you’re always late”…”Sorry, darling, traffic!” picking him up again at 8pm, dropping him home to babysit the younger two while husband and I go to our drama class at 8.15pm, and in between that I have to drop off the babysitter who  has  picked up the youngest one from school and stayed until I am home.  Without a car that seemed well-nigh impossible.

It wasn’t quite impossible, thanks to the drama teacher herself who drove us around, and the babysitter’s own home being within walking distance of ours. The thing is, we have had to rely on other people to help and that isn’t ideal. You can ask favours of other people for a short while but when does this become using them? And what about their own busy lives? Shouldn’t we stand on our own two feet, or drive on our own four wheels?

Perhaps at this stage I should introduce the family. We are a middle class, middle income family with three children living in a semi-detached house on the cheaper, north, side of an all-too-expensive town. We have a by-pass that cuts through the town in a rather bizarre manner. The south side of the by-pass has, on the whole, but not exclusively, more des-reses, but where we are is very pleasant. It’s just not near that many shops. We have a small ‘Express’ version of a supermarket chain, which sells most of what is needed but is certainly more expensive than its larger cousins. There are two corner shops, one better stocked than the other, a newsagents, a pharmacy, a pizza take- away place and a dog grooming parlour. We also have a vet, so dog owners at least can take care of their pooches inside and out. There are enough schools to cater for everyone unless you are very particular in which case you’d better move south of the by-pass and pay a bit, er lot, more.

We have three children at these local schools - two (Teenage Ted and Lexy) at secondary and one (Coco the Bear) at primary. (They have chosen these blog names themselves). The schools are within walking distance, (“Please drive me, I am tired/have got a lot to carry/will get wet/have a bone in my leg…”). My husband, E, commutes to London using bus, train and tube. The timetables tie in with each other at certain times of day. Outside these hours he has a 30 minute walk to/from the local train station (“Can you give me a lift, please?”). I work a couple of days a week in the local town - about two miles to my office - and the rest I spend at home doing all the normal housewifery type things like picking up after the children, cleaning, shopping, and, in theory, writing my best seller.  I’m also part of a growing community movement which is forming links between disparate groups and, as a clearly vital part of this, I spend much of Thursday having coffee and cake at a local church.

At a recent meeting to discuss these links it was suggested that we form a type of LETS group  (Local Exchange Trading Scheme) whereby local people exchange goods and services without needing money. The plan - as yet unfulfilled - has been to write down a list of what we could offer and what we would like to have. I had planned to offer lifts, deliveries and pick-ups using my huge green vehicle. In return, I hoped to find someone who could do some DIY and FINALLY put the bedroom door back on (we took it off and removed crucial pieces of wood around it when two kittens went missing somewhere beneath the floorboards, but that is another story with a happy ending - though not for the woodwork). Without a car I can’t do that. 

In fact, having a car has been important to my part in the local community. I have seen myself as a lift-giver. Now I can’t be and am turning into a lift-beggar. 

This is a curious development. I don’t like it. Being the person who could give lifts was something that defined me. Then again, it was something I was getting tired of, but I could never bring myself to say no, not even to Teenage Ted. Well I would say “I’m never giving you a lift to school again, do you hear me, you ungrateful little…” or some other sweet sentiments, but guess what, good parent that I am, I never stuck to my word. Now I can’t give any lifts! Yipee!

My legs ache with all the walking to and from Coco the Bear’s school though.