Why I feel powerful as a parent

In a country where parents sometimes feel vulnerable and helpless as they deal with their teenage children, today I feel very powerful because I have in my hands a commodity which every American teenager will fight to get. It is my daughter’s driver’s license which a judge in Manassas, Virginia handed me and instructed me to give and take away from my daughter as I wish.


It was packed courtroom. Scores of us parents and our children – mostly teenagers - sat in rows of benches as a Virginia judge spoke for almost an hour. He first started by pointing out that the reason all of us parents were invited to the courtroom to receive our children’s licenses was because the Commonwealth of Virginia wanted us to exercise our discretion on when our children could drive. If they did not follow our instruction, we could take the license from them.

After an hour, the judge began to call the names. He would shake the teenager’s hand, congratulate them, and then hand the license over to mom or dad. After waiting for what seemed like eternity, I heard the judge call “Rosaline Musu Conteh.” My seventeen-year twelfth grader stood up and we both went to the judge. The judge shook her hands, congratulated her, but handed the license to me. I felt a surge of power come all over my body. Now I have a powerful tool in my hands.

It has been a long journey before we got to today’s hearing to get the license. As soon as she turned fifteen years and six month in June, 2008, Rosaline dragged me to Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles to get her Learner’s Permit after passing the written test. After that, I spent the next year teaching her to drive and attend two very emotionally charged parent’s classes. In those classes, especially the final one, they showed us series of video clips about teen drivers who died in tragic car accidents. The goal was to see if parents still wanted their children to drive. At the end of the session, many of us teary-eyed parents hugged each other as we affirmed our commitment to allow our teenagers to drive.

After logging more than fifty hours of driving with Rosaline, and after she had taken a defensive driving class in her high school, Rosaline finally got a provisional driver’s license six months ago which allowed her to drive with only one teenager as passenger. Today’s license allows her to drive by herself provided she follows both the house rules and driving rules.

In his speech, the judge pointed out that the top most reasons teens get into accidents are emotional issues, talking on cell phones, and speed. He advised teens not to drive if they had emotional issues, and to turn their cell phones off once they got into their cars. He also informed them that a car was as dangerous as a loaded pistol, and could kill in an instant.

My next stop is the insurance company. With a new driver in the house, we need to add her to our policy, and that will cost a bunch of money. When my first child, Dona got her driver’s license four years ago, our insurance premium almost doubled. But with so many crazy schedules between my wife and I, I still believe it is worth the effort to have one more driver. And if she messes up, I will be glad to take the license and lock it in a safe place. Knowing how much my daughter likes to drive, I know she will follow the rules. Now I feel more powerful.