Dalton Meador

            When I was young, my dad drove a straight gear truck and I watched him pull the brake every day. What I saw was him pull it to the left then pull straight out. When I got home I just stared at it and I said,” what’s brakes do.” The next time I saw him do it was when he picked me up from day care.   We stopped on a hill he pulled the brake back out. 

   

         One day when I was four or five, I was playing in my dad’s truck and I was pretending to drive. I was playing in the truck bed and then looked in the window. The seats were very wide and big so I was able to stand on them.  My dad smoked so the smell of  smoke was in the air. I saw that the brake was down so I decided to play  with it.   I pulled the brake then the truck started to roll and I still was playing. I thought I was driving the car it was fun at first but then I was scared.  I hit the pole.  After I hit the pole I went flying backwards and hit the seat hurting my back.  It felt like hitting concrete.

            Later that day my mom told me to come in to the living room. she said Dalton how did you learn how to pull the hand brake? I said I don’t know I just watched dad do it so many times. So I thought it would not do anything so I just pulled it .  It felt like pulling the onions in our yard out of the ground. The next time I got in the truck I never wanted to pull it again.  

            On looking back, I learned not to mess with hand brakes but also not to mess with the pedals, stirring wheel or other stuff on a truck.  Looking back on it I realize I shouldn’t have done it.  I could have gotten hurt very badly.  I now understood some things were not for kids.