Backseat Driver

I have a 22 month old backseat driver in my car on a daily basis.  I don’t know really what to think about the whole situation.  I have someone telling me how to drive when I’ve been driving longer than he’s been alive.  But the truth of the matter is sometimes I listen to him and wonder if his advice is actually correct…what’s wrong with me!!

Corbin likes to go under bridges, so if he sees one he directs me to go under the bridge.  We don’t always have to go under a bridge to get to where we are going but he doesn’t seem to catch the concept.  One time he wanted to go under the bridge and I’m like no not this time when in fact I stopped, thought, and remembered that we did indeed need to go under the bridge.  I had forgotten where we were going!  Score one for the backseat driver.

At stop lights, regardless of the color, Corbin says “go, mommy”.  I’m trying to teach him that red is stop and green is go.  He’s slowly getting this concept, but at times I have to actually stop and think if I should be going because I have someone saying “go, go, go” in the backseat. It’s like having a bully in the backseat.  Unprotected left turns have actually become a thoughtful action now because I’m telling Corbin it’s green and we can go, but we can’t really if there’s a car coming….yikes!

And finally whenever we leave someplace I am often directed to “go home”.  However, sometimes we still have other places to go and cannot go home.  When I tell Corbin this, I get a list of other places that he would like to go: namely the park and church.  Oh sad day when those aren’t on the list either.  Although on occasion if it’s a nice day I have been persuaded to drive to the park and play.  Corbin is a very good negotiator:)

To sum up my experience: backseat driving is only fun for the person in the backseat.