Family Car

The family road trip is a journey for the brave of heart, especially when it involves tension between driver and navigator. Enter the Global Positioning System, which offers a measure of harmony to the family car. It was a four-week cross-country summer car trip that made me, the technology-averse navigator, a GPS believer. Here is how GPS works: a constellation of satellites transmits radio signals that allow receivers on the ground to pinpoint longitude, latitude and altitude. A network of ground stations known as the WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System)

My youngest child has earned her driver's license, and I think I am officially out of a job. The baby girl is driving herself to school and back, to sports practices and back, and to the mall and back. I am surprised to find that this, not her departure for college, is the signal for me to find real work. The job description of a parent includes many things -- feeding, clothing and sheltering among them. But on any given day, being a parent is mostly about driving. To school, to the doctor's office, to a friend's house, to Grandma's for Thanksgiving.

THE STATISTICS are sobering: Not only are teen drivers more likely to be charged with speeding and reckless driving violations than other drivers are, but they account for more than their share of deaths related to motor vehicles. Driver inexperience is one major cause, a fact not lost on Barbie Schluth of Ellicott City, parent of a 16-year-old on the verge of receiving her driver's license. "Because of her inexperience, I fear she won't react quickly enough to other drivers' actions," Schluth says.

STUART, Va. -- New Winston Cup fans may not be aware of Glen and Leonard Wood, whose roots are deep in NASCAR history. But for longtime followers, the Wood Brothers are every bit as well-known as the Petty clan, Junior Johnson and the Allisons -- Bobby, Donnie and Davey. Glen and Leonard Wood are the soft-spoken Virginians whose family business turned out to be owning race cars. They are celebrating 50 years in the sport this season, having compiled records that still stand: 80 superspeedway victories, 53 500-mile wins, 87 superspeedway poles and 26 superspeedway races won from the pole.

IT'S SUMMER VACATION time, and I'm sure you can't wait to jump into the family car and drive to fun and exciting new places, preferably before the family wakes up and realizes you're gone.But before you hit the road, you should make sure your car is in proper mechanical condition. Drive to your local gas station, beep your horn, and when a friendly, competent mechanic comes out to help you, ask him to please call the mental hospital, because you are hallucinating. There are no friendly, competent mechanics at gas stations anymore; there are nervous cashiers locked inside bulletproof enclosuressurrounded by smokeless-tobacco products.

For her parents and a Howard County 911 operator, Amber Reece O'Connor's entry into this world was a surprise: The baby girl -- 9 days old today -- was born eight weeks early, delivered by her father in the back of a station wagon beside U.S. 29 in Ellicott City."

Thank goodness there's no law against driving and eating lollipops.Whenever things got particularly rough on our recent cross-country car trip, I pulled out the candy. For us, not the kids."Not again," my husband groaned when the back-of-the-van chorus demanded the same story tape for what seemed like the 500th time.I just handed him his favorite cherry lollipop and played the tape, an audio version of the TV show "Dinosaurs." When we were still driving at midnight, I grabbed a chocolate pop and reminded myself that getting there is supposed to be half the fun.Of course, there's a lot to be said for family car trips.

MINNEAPOLIS -- Margie Coffeen was born in the front seat of her parents' car on a cold February day 31 years ago while her father was driving her mother to Children's Hospital in Buffalo, N.Y."He jokes that he held out his hands and caught me," says Margie Coffeen, who now lives in Eagan, Minn.Yesterday, Margie Coffeen was on the other end of the catch game when her husband, Paul, delivered their son in the front seat of the family car while on the way to the University of Minnesota Hospital.

DENTON -- The last time Norville R. Griffin spoke to his only child, Jamie, the 17-year-old high school senior asked for $20 to help pay for a weekend retreat with friends in a religious youth group."

RICHMOND, Va. -- Wally Dallenbach Jr. is driving a Ford Thunderbird, the hottest model stock car on the Winston Cup circuit. But Dallenbach's Ford isn't a front-runner, 14l a fact that doesn't bother Dallenbach, who still is learning the ropes.It is an unusual position for Dallenbach, the son of the successful former IndyCar driver, Wally Dallenbach, who is now the director of competition and chief steward of the IndyCar circuit.Dallenbach grew up snowmobiling with Michael Andretti and Al Unser Jr. He grew up at his father's side in the world of Indianapolis-style racing, the world of open cockpits and open-wheel racing.