I was 14 years old. My mom and stepdad were in Hawaii for a few weeks. Their vacation represented a vacation for me as well. I spent the two weeks occasionally attending school, having massive food fights on our front lawn and smoking pot pretty much around the clock. One day while sitting around high, my friend Jesse suggested we take my mom's car down to the video store. It seemed like a pretty sensible idea, despite the fact that I had never driven before. Jesse and I hopped into my mom's blue volvo and headed for the video store. Everything was going fine until we reached a stretch of street that was quite narrow. As a car approached from the opposite direction I had a hard time judging how much space we had on each side and I side swiped a park car on our passenger side.

The wise thing to do seemed to be to keep going. I was too shaken up to make it to the video store so we just turned around and headed home. I parked my mom's car in the garage as I had found it. The damage was not extreme, but certainly noticeable above the passenger side front tire.

I checked my mom's schedule and discovered three things that could work in my favor. She was going to get home late one night from her trip. The next morning she was going to drive to work for an early morning client. And the following day she was taking her car into the repair shop (owned by a family member who usually tended to all scrapes, scratches and dents).

I ended up getting away with my side-swiping, but later told my mom about it. The most astounding thing for me was how in the days that followed the accident, while my parents were still in hawaii, my friend Jesse kept encouraging me to take the car out again. Even in my pot induced stupor, I remember feeling how insensitive and reckless this guy was.