Driving Decisions: Remaining Independent After Giving Up a Car

An invitation by AARP urging the recipient to take a state-approved driver safety course serves as a sobering reminder of one’s age and the potential disaster posed behind the wheel as senses and reaction times are affected by a naturally slowing brain.

The retiree-focused group offers a financial reward, a savings on vehicle insurance as an incentive, but an even more effective incentive likely should be information from sources that the chances of causing a crash and even killing someone increases dramatically as we age.

It was this incentive that prompted Pauline Huntsman to give up driving.

Pauline, now 91, was born and raised in the Snake Spring valley area of Bedford County and moved to Morrisons Cove when she married Don Huntsman.

They settled in Waterside, close to Don’s boyhood home and set about life raising their four children.

Years ago the couple sold their home next to the Waterside Church of the Brethren along Rt. 36 and bought a cottage at the Village at Morrisons Cove, Martinsburg.

With Don’s passing two decades ago, Pauline settled into the rhythm of what was a full life for a retiree, despite being alone.

The nearly new 1990 Buick LeSabre the two purchased continued to serve Pauline well and she didn’t hesitate to get behind the wheel for jaunts throughout the region.

“It was a big car, but I felt protected,” she said.

But all that changed for Pauline when several months ago the unspeakable occurred. She didn’t kill someone, she didn’t even crash, but she just knew it was time to give up driving.

Pauline took her car, a tank by today’s standards, for routine maintenance to Bill’s Garage in Waterside and she came away disappointed.

The Buick was suffering from thirty years of winter road salt on Pennsylvania highways and the impact rendered it unsafe.

“The shocks had rusted out and if fumes would come up into the car, it could kill me,” she said, repeating the evaluation by the garage mechanic.

Repair estimates to make the car safe again came in at $3,000,

In the company of her son-in-law, they drove the car to its final resting place, Johnny’s U Pull It, on Mill Run Road, outside Altoona.

Pauline walked away with $300, but without a means of getting around, something she valued as she focused on remaining independent.

Family members knew she was still of sound mind and urged her to consider purchasing another car, but Pauline knew exactly what she would do.

“I just felt it was time. I knew my reflexes were not as quick as they used to be,” she said. “I gave it up on my own.”

But she was facing the rest of her life without the ability to independently get to the doctor or grocery store, a sobering moment for many elderly.

What goes around comes around, as we remind our selves from time to time. Always willing to help others, Pauline discovered that help was waiting in the wings.

“Randy gets me groceries all the time,” she said of daughter Betsy’s husband who lives in Carson Valley.

A friend who lives in a cottage at the Village has also stepped forward.

“Different ones will take me and other have said they will take me if I need,” Pauline said.

A few years ago Pauline curtailed her driving with the goal of staying out of congested areas around Altoona, but she routinely got herself into her dermatologist outside Hollidaysburg and for groceries in Roaring Spring and East Freedom.

“That’s about all I would drive,” she said.

It’s been close to a year since Pauline made what can be a traumatic decision and to date she has yet to miss medical appointments and has always had plenty of food.

The decision to stop driving is one she does not regret.

“My friends have been real good to me,” she said.