Day at the DMV

Getting my California driver's license after 10 years away required standing in four lines over an hour and a half. Two of those lines I stood in twice.

Surprisingly, given the bureaucratic maze, the woman behind the counter was able to look up my old California drivers license, including the photo I took when I was 16, and give me my old number back.

"You haven't changed."

"Sorry?

"You look the same," she said, turning her monitor for me to see. The pale kid with the hair standing straight up looked almost unbearably innocent. Goofy, naïve, and oh-so-earnest. I wanted to either smack him or hide from him.

"My face was a lot skinnier then," I contradicted.

But she didn't really care. She stapled my forms together and sent me to stand in my third line, to retake the photo.

The fourth line was for the written exam. The first time I stood in it to get my test: 18 questions, miss 4 and you fail. I'd studied the Driver's Handbook for about an hour before this moment, including all the time I'd just spent in various lines.

The second time was to turn in my test. As I was waiting to get it scored, a Chinese woman poked me in the back.

"Can I help you?"

"Shhh! Don't turn around."

She snuck her test form under my elbow so I could see her Question 13. "Does that mean slippery or curvy road?" she whispered.

"Slippery," I whispered back, amazed I'd so easily betrayed my integrity, and that I was being asked to do so by a forty-year-old Chinese woman, not some high school soccer star who the 16-year-old kid in the license photo wanted to impress.

She persisted, "There's no law against smoking in the car, right?"

I'd seen the same question and guessed there was, when children were in the car.

"I don't know," I whispered back, honestly.

Then I was called up to the counter. One answer incorrect. (You need to notify the DMV five days after selling your car; not repainting it. I think I liked the idea of the DMV getting lots of submissions like "My Seabring has flames on the doors now" or "My CRV is now electric eggplant. It glistens in the sunlight.")

My license, with the new photo, will come in the mail. Then I’ll be an official California resident once again.