Buckle Up!

When I was growing up, many cars didn’t have seat belts. Nevertheless, my brother and I were told to buckle up on every drive—no exceptions to Dad’s rule.

Now that I have kids of my own, they also have to wear their seat belts on every trip. During my daughter’s driver’s education lesson, she hopped into the back seat and put her seat belt on when it was another student’s turn to drive. An oncoming vehicle hit them head-on. Everyone was seriously injured. A paramedic said the seat belt had broken my daughter’s sternum—but that if it hadn’t been there, she’d have gone through the windshield. My dad’s rule saved my daughter’s life.

—Penny Males

Lucas, Texas