An update of Rene Descartes’ declaration, “I think therefore I am,” is long overdue. For my generation the existential truth is, “I drive, therefore I am.”

I still vividly recall the freedom and power I felt on May 12, 1960, my sixteenth birthday, when I passed my driver’s license test. As drivers, we not only have the liberty to go wherever, whenever we want, our vehicles become integrated with our persona. Watch any car commercial.The ads are not about the vehicle but about how you’ll feel driving it. We’ll feel forever youthful driving that sleek sports car. Or forever in charge steering that rugged 4×4 pickup through hostile environments. Those vehicles cruising across our TV screens are an elixir of power and eternal youth. 

Until we’re too old to drive. And just how old IS too old?

Traffic safety experts sidestep a precise answer. So does AI. When I typed in the question, AI offered a laundry list of primarily subjective guidelines: declining physical or cognitive ability, slow reaction times, getting lost easily, frequent close calls, or loved ones expressing concern. Oftentimes, those “loved ones” will be less loved if they start harping about Grandpa’s driving.

Kaiser-Permanente, in a helpful online guide to “Healthy Aging,” offers cold, hard data:

• People age seventy and older are more likely to crash than any other age group besides drivers age twenty-five and younger. In other words, driving skills improve with age, then regress. We’re no safer now than when we were air-headed teens, oblivious to our mortality.
• Because older drivers are more fragile, they are more likely to get hurt or die from these crashes.

A joint study by the American Society on Aging and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration offers this chilling observation: “Most people drive seven to ten years longer than they should.”

Giving up your car is life changing. I did so two years ago, BUT I had no intention of giving up driving. When I moved to Seattle from rural eastern Washington, my motivations were to save money and reduce my carbon footprint. I gave my 2009 Dodge to public radio. I planned to use mass transit when possible, and rent a car when necessary. 

Public transit — busses, light rail, ride shares — are great. Rental cars not so much. I’ve rarely needed them, but when I do, they come equipped with recently developed, high tech amenities that I can’t readily figure out — like how to START the darn thing. 

I was delighted when my retirement community, Horizon House, recently introduced a car-sharing plan. For a nominal expense, residents can rent an electric vehicle, fully insured, and be trained to drive it before we hit the road. Because I’m past age eighty, I’d have to take a driving test to participate. I think that’s an excellent idea. I’d like to be assured that I’m as good a driver as I think I am — a veteran, after all, of several solo cross-country road trips.

A no-injury accident last year, just after I turned eighty, sowed a seed of doubt. I was driving a rental car in an unfamiliar town. Looking for a place to pull over to make a phone call, I blew through a stop sign and collided with another car — which had a student driver at the wheel. Both cars required towing.

A more experienced driver might have spotted me and taken defensive action. Several people who gathered round the crunched cars claimed it was a notorious intersection with frequent collisions. Still, I was clearly at fault. I acknowledged as much to the police officer, and readily paid my fine. 

And still, there was that traumatized wanna-be driver. I sent her a gift and a note of encouragement. My insurance readily paid for damages to the rental car. I was further grieved to learn that her family’s insurance company stalled for months before paying up. 

I’m sure her dad had plenty to say about eighty-year-old drivers. While I waited for the tow truck, he showed up with his work rig to tow away the family car. Grim-faced, he grunted as we were introduced and maintained a glum silence while hooking up the vehicles. It was Memorial Day. I imagine he’d been home, tending the barbecue. I’d ruined their holiday. 

That’s the thing about our roadways. Most of us do not work in the realm of public safety. Yet our roads and streets — open to all — are where we are most responsible for the safety and well-being of our fellow citizens. It’s where we have true community, where our very lives depend on the skills and consideration of our fellow travelers.

Why is it, then, that I’m struggling with the question: do I keep driving? I enjoy walking and using public transit. I’ve needed to rent a car only a handful of times over the past  two years, and maybe those trips weren’t all that essential. Could it be — and here, dear reader, I’ll reveal the naked truth — that my ego still clings to that steering wheel? Could it be that my ego — my false self — is deflecting any suggestion that I’m “too old” to drive? 

For now, I’m side-stepping the issue. I have no immediate need to drive anywhere. The car-share program will wait. My driver’s license is still in my wallet, valid until May 12, 2031. It is merely a plastic ID card. I’m working on making it not who I am.