Right now I’m learning to drive a bus, and I feel like I’ve gotten past the ‘don’t let the bus intimidate you’ phase. To me, driving a bus isn’t intimidating, in fact, its surprisingly pleasant. On the air-cusioned seat, it feels more like you are flying at 5 feet off the ground. I try to pretend the dimensions of the bus are an extension of my own body.
Thing is, I’m not fond of ‘buying property’ (slang for hitting/scraping/jumping the curb). I’m so leery of it, in fact that its working against me. My problem, you see, is when turning right, I’m trying so hard to avoid hitting the curb that I’m leaving a gap big enough for a frieght train to slip in on my right side by making this huge, wide right turns. Today, probably because my right mirror wasn’t tilted low enough I was repeately told to tighten up my turns.
I know I’ll get it eventually, its just the driving part is in a way the least forgiving aspect of the training. Remembering rules and procedures is easy for me- I have all evening/weekends to practice as much as I need. But right now we only have so much time to actually drive in a bus, and that really only gives you so many right turns to nail this on. There’s no way I can get ‘extra’ practice and above all else it is crucial I am confident in what I’m doing, otherwise the instructors won’t think I can mentally handle this job. Arggggh! :mad:
