Tangie Wilson is opening up about the “stressful” day she had when her 8-year-old daughter took the family car for a ride to Target last month.
Wilson’s elementary school-aged daughter, Zoe, became an internet sensation in Bedford, Ohio, after rebelliously driving the family’s SUV—along with their dog, Bear—to Target on Sept. 15. According to Wilson, Zoe was upset after an argument with her older sister the night before and decided that a joyride might help ease her frustrations.
“She never has done any of this before,” Wilson told The New York Times on Sunday, “so it still was not registering that she left with the dog.”
The mother of three daughters—ages 15, 11, and 8-year-old Zoe—explained that she was asleep when Zoe came into her room to ask for the iPad. Wilson went back to sleep, believing her daughter had settled down in her room or on the couch with the device. Unbeknownst to her, Zoe had slipped out of the house around 7 a.m., taking her mother’s car keys, wallet, and ID. The third grader then embarked on an erratic drive to the local Target, bringing the family dog along for the ride.
@cbsnews An 8-year-old girl was caught on camera swerving on a road in Ohio, as a driver behind her was on the phone with police and captured her driving toward a Target, where she stopped to shop. Local authorities said she was located and brought home safely. #bedford #ohio #target ♬ original sound – cbsnews
Other drivers noticed the white SUV swerving through lanes. One person called the police, believing the car’s driver was under the influence.
“I tried to signal her to slow down or stop if possible, and she just kept going,” Justin Kimery, a witness to the event, said. “It looked like she was distracted inside the vehicle.”
Thirty minutes after Zoe left, her older daughter came into the room to ask where her younger sister and their dog were.
“And I’m like, ‘She just asked for her iPad, what do you mean she’s not here?’”
After contacting the police, a neighbor discovered that Zoe had been caught on their Ring camera getting into the family’s SUV and backing out of the driveway. What started as a brief missing person case ended when police found Zoe safe at Target nearly two hours later. The Bedford Police Department seemed to take a lighthearted approach to the incident, sharing a message on their Facebook page.
“She walked out of the store so normal, like nothing happened,” Wilson said of her daughter’s response to being found. “Her response was like, ‘I only hit a mailbox and it was green.'”
Wilson was more relieved to have her daughter home safe and sound than focused on disciplining the bold third grader. However, Zoe still faces a minor punishment.
“I spoke to her and reassured her that I loved her, how I wouldn’t want anything to happen to her, and how dangerous and big the situation was,” Wilson said. “But when we did go places moving forward if she wanted a slushy from the store, I would tell her no as a consequence.”
While Wilson is relieved that her daughter wasn’t harmed during the joy ride, it was still a “stressful” situation for any parent.
“Actually, to be honest, I still haven’t had time to process it mentally,” she said. “And I don’t think I had been home for 10 minutes before it came across my phone that it made the news. Then it was all over social media, and my phone was blowing up from everybody.”
“So for me it was very stressful, very exhausting — mentally, physically, emotionally,” she added.
“I could not sleep because it all started with her leaving the house when I was asleep. It was like someone snatched the rug from under my feet. And it was just all these questions — everybody wanted to know who this little girl was and how did she do it.”
Now that Zoe has learned from the experience, Wilson uses it to motivate her daughter whenever she feels she can’t accomplish something.
“Well, the week after that, she was upset about going to school. She was like, “I’m worried because we’re doing multiplication, and multiplication is hard.” And I’m like, “Zoe, did you know how to drive a car before you drove the car the other day?” And she was like, “No.” And I was like, “OK, so just like that with multiplication, you don’t know how to do it, but you’re going to learn.”
“So that has encouraged her a lot as far as her schoolwork,” Wilson said.