The DMV

What kind of blog would this be if there was only one awkward post about how I’m a writer but … not really a writer? And what kind of a writer would I be if I never actually got around to writing anything other than a little intro about my aspirations when it comes to moming and writing? And not actually writing anything?

So to start things off write… I mean right. Let’s have a little chat about an adventure I took on last week with my husband and two kids in tow. Maybe some day I can use it for fodder for a book. But probably a comedic book, because today I’m going to write about going to the DMV (the Department of Motor Vehicles for those who don’t speak in acronym), and, well, children don’t generally go to the DMV since they don't drive, so writing a children’s book about the DMV? Can’t be a thing.

Let’s start with some foundation though, before I talk about our visit. I’m originally from Idaho. Land of the potatoes. But I don’t live there now. In fact, I haven’t lived there for more than a few days at a time since 2011, so I guess that’s kind of six years ago, and it was definitely past time to update my driver’s license since I’ve been married, oh, only like FIVE years and my license and therefore all my bank and credit accounts were in my maiden name, despite the fact I have two children and a kind of awesome husband.

You see, in Idaho you can renew your license for pretty much forever. So, if you’re planning on becoming a vampire, you should probably move to Idaho. By the time you finally renew your license again, all the people who used to work at the DMV will have either died or moved on with their lives and they’ll never even notice you aren’t aging.

Anyway, a couple days before my 21st birthday in (this is going to date me) 2009, I headed to the DMV for my license and have had an “under 21” formatted license ever since.

Since it wasn’t expired, I didn’t see a point in making a switch to a Utah license, especially since I was still going to college and my address wasn’t exactly what you’d call consistent. Then we bought a house, and subsequently a car and right before that I had a baby and lost my license… wait what? Yeah, no. Anything official requires state ID. I dare you to try buying a car then withdrawing your down payment with nothing but a photocopy that your work took of your driver’s license. I feel like I should  win an award for somehow managing that. But after the fiasco, I knew it was finally time to just bite the bullet and convert to a Utah driver’s license.

After a quick phone call and dutiful web search, I surmised that heading to the DMV earlier in the day would decrease my chances of an hours long wait with two children and a hangry mommy, because don’t we all get that way when we’re tired and stressed? Don’t tell me if you don’t. Because I need to pretend you can relate.

The lot was pretty full when we rolled up on our new wheels, and yes, that deterred me. But when my husband went and asked someone that worked there what kind of wait we’d experience (this is after he went in and looked at how many chairs were full – an assessment not quantitative enough to fill my need for details), and the answer was about five minutes? Well, I know divine intervention when I see it, and light from Heaven was shining all over that DMV.

As my two-year-old tossed her miniature basketball all around the lines upon lines of plastic chairs, giggling wildly, my husband and I took turns filing out the necessary paperwork for my state switch and his renewal, you know, because we’re all or nothing.

The first and fastest thing to happen was a trip to a booth to get our new pictures taken. I wonder if this is first to deter people from going through the whole process. You know, they take your picture at the beginning and it’s so bad that you have to stop for a minute and decide if you really, truly want to drive if that’s what you’re going to be looking like on your ID for the next couple years.

I don’t know, maybe that’s also why Utah’s driver’s licenses expire faster than Idaho – the pictures are SO bad, and on the off chance they’re good, then no worries, they’ll replace it with a bad one really, really soon. I’m fairly confident Utah DMV pictures are a contest to see how bad they can make you look.

We all know the tricks. Ruffle your hair. Keep your chin tilted up to flatten out any additional chins. Smile just enough that you don’t look stoned but not enough to make you look creepy…

And yet the second I saw my picture, there it was. Another chin. Not to mention my smile was turning down in the corners to look like a nasty little frown. And my husband, who at least I consider to be ridiculously attractive, same story. So I have this conspiracy theory.

Though everyone complains about how bad their driver’s license photos are, I wager that each DMV is equipped with a photo editing program. They take your picture, and the program automatically expands your face to make you look 20 pounds heavier, then they have a second chin they install on everyone’s photo because uniformity.

Unfortunately, after getting our photos taken, we did decide to finish the process and make our licenses official. Since I was switching states, I had to take the 25 question open book test, and yes, I double checked almost every single answer because wouldn’t it be awful if I failed because some crazy Utah stop sign didn’t actually have eight sides?

The bulk of my answers, which I submitted while my toddler was trying to take her own driving test at the computer next to me (don’t judge) and my husband was changing our two-month-old’s poop-splosion, were related to drinking and driving and the implications of that – questions that someone who’s never had a sip will probably never need to know but, who knows, because even driving sober in Utah is pretty dangerous since people here are notorious for bad driving.
Which brings me to another, more circuitous thought: people here drive poorly because they're not actually licensed because they don’t want to look horrible on said licenses…

Anyway. I survived. And if I ever get pulled over, you can bet that double chin and scowling smile will be making some officer somewhere feel so bad for me I might just get off with a warning. That, or it’ll make him think I’m on drugs, which I guess means it’s a good think I know all about how those laws relate to driving.

Here’s to hoping your next license photo turns out better than mine.