P-plate rites of passage

From running away from home (which was usually to a friend’s house for a few hours), cutting - or questionably colouring - your hair, underage piercings, or tattoos, to rebellious behaviour (along with a whole lot of other things I will not mention) - certain activities have become synonymous with being a teen.

Along with these, are rites of passage - events that mark the transition from childhood to adulthood. One of these is undoubtedly getting your P-plates, or if you are like me (lazy) it is having friends who got theirs before the age of 21.

And, let’s be honest (maybe just not in front of your own kids), this time of unparalleled freedom, where parents were no longer required to drive you everywhere, were the best!

Firstly, let’s talk about the independence!

While as a nearly 40-year-old woman, this has become more and more overrated over the years, as a teen (I’d happily have someone chauffer me around), having that freedom away from your parents was the best thing to have ever happened.

You could hop in yours or a friend’s car and just drive for the sake of driving. Which in a lot of cases was what you’d do.

I recall road trips to the coast, a good hour away from where I grew up, just because. Sometimes we’d literally arrive and then just turn back around and come home.

Other times though, we had dedicated missions... usually Maccas. I mean, doesn’t everybody need a late-night cheeseburger and Coke? 

Ah, the number of laps - or 'mainies' - of my hometown’s main drag completed as a teen would have to be in the thousands.

While I was always the passenger (I didn’t sit my licence test until 21), most of my friends were driving while I was still in year 12, which meant weekends were spent aimlessly doing loops around the main part of town along with half of the other student population.

As we did this, curated playlists were listened to on car stereos and many gossip sessions were had.

This brings me to mixtapes (mixed tapes) or CDs.

What car you or your friends had would mean the difference between recording mixed tapes or mixed CDs (it was advisable to have both on hand).

Creating playlists for a variety of occasions - summer, graduation, beach road trips, lap nights, breakups, or nights out - curated compilations of everything from pop anthems, and angry headbangers to heartbreak ballads were made to create the soundtrack to our teen lives.

Along with this, there were many sing-alongs and wound-down windows where the music would, ridiculously loudly, blare out of (because does it even count if it’s not at full volume)?

For me, this was perhaps the greatest thing to come from my friends getting their licences.

As a young year 12 in Victoria, even if I’d wanted to sit my Ps, I couldn’t until the following year. But because many of my friends were older, I reaped the benefits of their newly acquired licence.

This meant no more mum or public bus to and from school which was not only time-saving but my god did I feel cool.

Arriving in the school car park, feeling like a true adult as we hopped out of my friend’s Honda right next to our English teacher, often receiving jealous glares from non-licenced students - it was like living the dream.

Because aesthetics wasn’t just important for your own personal style but every extension of yourself too, including your car.

This usually began by naming your car. The Beast was a pretty common one but there were also some niche titles like The Gospel Bus – a name given to my friend’s Tarago after the soundtrack for Sister Act somehow found its way on, along with Frank, the Ford. According to my friend, "He [the car] just seems like a Frank.”

On top of this, there were many visits to car retailers where random assortments of decorative accessories – car seat covers, steering wheel covers, air fresheners, stickers - were purchased and then placed/affixed to their cars, including hideous eyelashes for the headlights which my friend insisted gave her car 'diva personality'.

While now, as a full-time taxi driver to two children, I like to avoid car trips, much preferring a night in front of Netflix with a wine, twenty years ago, there was really nothing better.

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