Grandpa Cannot Drive Anymore

We freak out when there is something wrong with the car, or if Junior crashes it on his first date. Junior’s driver’s licence anoints him as an adult, as a man. Fast forward to 60 years later. Junior is old. He cannot drive. His reflexes are slow coupled with Alzheimer’s disease. After his retirement, kids and grand children visit him quite often to cheer him up, if he still lives in his house.

The fact that he cannot drive to his heart’s delights erodes him emotionally. But it also makes him unapproachable, grumpy, bitter even suicidal. The family is fed up, because they don’t know what he wants.

First of all, he is the lucky one. He has family that still want to be with him. Millions of old people globally don’t have any family to speak off because young people find old age repulsive. They have all kinds of excuses.

Young people don’t like the way grand parents smell. They don’t like the way grandparents chew tobacco and other habits from the old country. They are slow and are an embarrassment to their friends. My favourite uncle used to fart freely, which reduced us to giggles because  our grandparents were raising us and our cousins.

What families don’t understand is that the inability to drive a car might be the reason for Grandpa Junior’s depression. Patience is the access key. Grand children can sit him in the driver’s seat of their digital cars and coax some answers.

l What was your first vehicle?

l Who taught you how to drive?

l Where did you live?

l How much was gas back then?

l What places do you miss because you cannot drive?

That is how you can help parents and grandparents accept their present condition. Yours too. Fast forward to you in ‘23. How do you see your life if u can’t drive anymore?

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.