I got my North Carolina Driver’s License today!!!
I am SO relieved. I had been dreading getting my license changed over since the day I moved here. I realize this shouldn’t be as big a deal as it is, but given my history with the DMV, it is an enormous milestone.
For normal people, a trip to the DMV is nothing more than an inconvenience—it takes a while, there’s lots of bureaucracy, and there are other things you’d rather be doing. But ever since I first got my learner’s permit, trips to the DMV have inevitably been fraught with misery and peril.
I had to attempt the road test four times before I got my first license.
That’s right, laugh it up. Just know that I’m still crying on the inside.
I took Road Test #1 in New York City. I ran a stop sign almost immediately. The instructor was disgusted. “Do you realize you just broke the law??” he thundered. “Turn around right now and take me back before you get us killed.” That was the end of that.
Road Test #2, the next summer, I decided to take in Cape Cod, where I was living with my grandmother. I sat for hours listening to the DMV’s hold music waiting to schedule the appointment. I was all set for this one. My local friends had assured me that the road test there was a cinch. You didn’t even have to parallel park! Just do a K-turn. I did K-turns in the driveway in Grandma’s Camry until the tires went bald. I memorized road signs until my eyes bled. The day of the test, I was told that because my parents hadn’t signed my application to take the road test, I couldn’t take it. I’d had naively had Grandma sign it.
“But my parents are in New York,” I said. “I’m staying with Grandma.” Another brilliant move.
“Is she your legal guardian?” The officer asked. “If you’d forged your parent’s signatures on the document and told me they’d signed it, you could take the test. But now that I know they’re not here and can’t sign, no deal.” So, if I’d been dishonest, I would have gotten what I wanted. Thanks, DMV.
“But she’s my Mom’s Mom!” I argued. “That should make her even more qualified than my parents!” Arguing was futile.
So, no road test. And I’d been so close, I could almost taste the licensey goodness! Scream! But the third time’s the charm, right?
Road Test #3 came the following fall. My father and I had scheduled it to take place in upstate New York, so that I wouldn’t have to drive in the city. We drove up to Utica the evening before the test and spent the night.
The instructor the next morning was gruff, and I was nervous. But I was on a roll. I aced the K-turn and parallel-parked like a dream. Success! All my preparation had paid off! As we returned to the testing site and I put the car in park, the instructor turned to me.
“You failed before we even pulled out of the parking lot,” he said, “and let me tell you why.”
We had begun the test in an empty parking lot. Before pulling out, I had checked both my mirrors, but I had failed to turn and look over my shoulder, to make sure no cars had materialized behind me in the empty parking lot.
Why he couldn’t have just told me this right after it happened, I don’t know. The thought that he let me take the entire road test when he knew from the very beginning that he was going to fail me, is troubling. Such is the way of the DMV, though. Mine is not to question why.
Road test #4 came a few months after that. Hope springs eternal. I was driving a Thunderbird I wasn’t accustomed to, weaving in and out of traffic snarls beneath an elevated expressway in the Bronx. At the end of the test the instructor turned to me. I was prepared for anything.
“Well, you’re borderline,” he said. “You just barely squeaked by. I probably shouldn’t give you a pass, but I will. Just don’t get into any accidents.”
Hallelujah! I became licensed! The skies opened! The roads opened! I could drive in a car by myself! The fourth time was the charm!
Knock on wood, in the nearly ten years since I passed that final road test, I have never been in even a minor fender bender. I’d like to think it’s because I’m an excellent driver, but deep down in my heart, I think it’s mostly because I’m afraid of the DMV. I don’t want to lose my license and have to take another damn road test.
Excited by the prospect of going out to dinner, I decided on a whim to do my hair last night. Twenty frustrating minutes later, I realized that I had no idea what I was doing. I apparently have a huge gap of experience in the field of hair do-ing. True, I can’t remember the last time I made my hair do anything except be in a ponytail or a bun. But just because I don’t usually do my hair, does that mean that now, at the age of twenty-seven, I can’t do it, even if I want to?
Clearly, it does.
I now regret all of the opportunities I missed out on to learn and practice this useful skill. Countless sleepovers during which I dreamily allowed friends to curl my hair and straighten it and make it do things, all while I was busy watching Teen Wolf and picking at my cuticles, and not paying the least bit of attention to style or technique.
The bizarre hairdo I ended up with that evening looked like something my four year old niece would have come up with if she’d been playing with my hair while sitting on the couch behind me watching Hannah Montana. Eventually I gave up and went back to the bun.
There are two kinds of women in the world, I realized. Those who have acquired experience in the ways of hair and are fairly competent stylists, and those like me, who are constantly asking the first kind to do their hair for them.
I realize that some skills are innate—while others must be learned and practiced. However, I am now more aware than ever that I am bad at distinguishing between the two.
Take jumping, for example. A few years ago spent a weekend in a cabin in Vermont with a bunch of people I barely knew. I was one of the youngest people there, which made me feel super cool, and perhaps a bit overeager. At one point, the guys in the cabin began competing with each other to touch the floor of the cabin’s loft bedroom, getting a running start and leaping one at a time; and mostly missing. Guys who were just barely taller than me were almost making it, but I was the only girl there who seemed to want to try it myself.
“Hold on. I don’t find jump much. Do I actually know what I am doing?” I never asked myself that crucial question; I just assumed I had the skills necessary to compete. I took a running start, jumped with all my might and made it about two inches off the ground. A dozen guys I was vaguely trying to impress roared with laughter. I now know that I have absolutely no vertical jump whatsoever—although I had clearly assumed that I did. Now everyone else knew too. This is what we call natural selection at work.
“Aye, I can spin ye a fair yarn about a time when me management skills were tested on the job. Arrrr!”
Even though today is National Talk Like a Pirate Day, you might not want to bust that out at a job interview. Sure, it breaks the ice– but only if by ‘ice’ you mean ‘chance at getting a second interview’.
A group of drunk girls were laughing and shrieking in the courtyard below our bedroom window. My alarm was set for 5am, which is when I needed to get up to drive Brian to the airport. When the girls started playing “Red Rover” is when I decided enough was enough.
“Girls,” I shouted down from between the blinds. “Can you please keep it down?” My voice sounded shockingly loud and petulant in the darkness. It also showcased that, although I am on the 3rd floor, my proximity to them was very close.
“Are you going to tell our mom?” one of them sassed. And the others chorused, “Okayyy.”
“Thank you,” I shouted back.
And with that, complete silence. As I drifted back to sleep, I decided that either they were scaling my apartment building with knives in their teeth and I wouldn’t wake to see morning, or they were fairly polite drunk girls who didn’t really want to disturb anyone.
I awoke safe and sound. Thank you, polite drunk girls! This place is almost starting to feel like home, except for the fact that you listened when I asked you to be quiet.
Dear Government,
I have made some bad investment decisions in the past. These include:
-Added applications to my cell phone plan that I rarely use, like “SnoodBlaster” which was only fun for like 10 minutes
-Bought tight pants; accidentally put them in dryer, making them too small to wear again
-Signed up for Netflix, then allowed boyfriend to queue “National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets”
I realize now that these were bad choices, but there is no way for me to recoup my losses for any of them. I would like you to consider the fact that if I go bankrupt as the result of continued bad decisions like these, it could affect millions of other American investments and lives. It probably won’t– I’m just saying, you never know. Please bail me out? I only need about ten billion dollars. I promise to make it worth your while.
Sincerely,
Molly
I Need to get a Job or Take a Class or Something!
Having spent most of my life in the Northeast, my knowledge of other regions of the country is limited. This problem is amplified by having grown up in New York City, which, I eventually learned, is unlike anywhere else in the United States, and possibly the planet. So I don’t know jack about what to expect from living in North Carolina. I will be the first to admit it. This should be fine, since I know I have a lot to learn. I am keeping an open mind and am excited to meet people and explore my new locale.
Still, I have found that I do have a few silly and romanticized notions from my heretofore limited exposure to the South. For example, yesterday I came across a name badge from our local supermarket on the sidewalk. The name on the badge said RHETT.
I got all giggly and excited.
If you haven’t had a stranger call you on the phone and ask, within five minutes, how much you weigh, and whether you’ve ever been hospitalized, then you’ve never experienced the magic of searching for an individual health insurance plan.
I recognize that being in a decent physical condition is something to value. But I’ve never thought of it in monetary terms before, and talking to someone whose job it is to think that way can make you feel uneasy.
“This guy I’m on the phone with,” I began to realize, “works for a company that wants to make money off of me, which they won’t do if I get sick or hurt. And if I AM sick or hurt, he wants nothing to do with me. I’m on my own!”
It’s enough to give you the creeps, even before the agent who told me, “You’ll notice that health insurance coverage is slightly more expensive for women.” I had noticed that, I replied. “It’s because THEY actually go to the doctor!” he said, and chuckled. Health insurance brokers: not only persistent—they’re also hilarious!
Another agent warned me that certain prescription medicines might not be covered under various plans—but that I likely wouldn’t know which ones those were until I tried to fill them. “If the prescriptions are too expensive, the insurance company isn’t going to want to pay for them,” he reasoned. Certainly not! Why should I expect my health insurance company to pay for my expensive medicine? It should get to keep all of my money!
Nearly every agent I’ve spoken with (and there have been quite a few—once you put your phone number out there and request a quote, they crawl out of the woodwork), as has asked me why I am interested in acquiring health insurance. I began to wonder—is this a trick question? Are they hoping you’ll slip up and say, “Because I have a heart conditio—uh, I mean…no reason.” I usually level with them. “I need health insurance because I don’t want to go bankrupt if I break my leg and have to go to the hospital. I’m scared that I might be injured and suddenly I’ll be $500,000 in debt.” The best part is, they always respond, “Oh, I know—totally. It’s scary.” This response does not increase my sympathy for the cause of privatized healthcare. At least SOME form of gambling is legal in every state.
I wasn’t going to get up early this morning. I figured I’d sleep in, since it was the weekend. Plus I’d gotten to bed late the night before. Ahem.
What got me out of bed in an instant was the realization that I could watch the Sunday morning news shows.
This is becoming a sickness. I can’t keep doing this to myself! I am obsessed with news coverage of the presidential race. I compulsively scan the internet for more damning information about Sarah Palin. (Granted, the hits DO keep on coming. Good job allowing Wasilla to charge rape victims for forensic kits when you were mayor, Palin! Apparently you actually said “Yes please wait maybe not thanks but no thanks for the bridge to nowhere.”)
Still. I need to cut back before I lose my mind. The whole thing is like a rash that I can’t leave alone. If I’d only stop scratching it, it would heal a little. But I can’t! It’s so itchy and hurty!
And looking at the polls right now makes me break out in hives. I need to hibernate until Nov. 2nd. With one day of wakefulness during which I vote. Who’s with me?
You just have to sit back with a few glasses of wine and watch “The Wedding Date” with the dog. Of course, the movie was his choice. Damn it, Charlie! I don’t need to see Debra Messing as an unlucky-in-love spinster who has to hire Durmot Mulroney as her wedding date! Oh, all right. If you insist. Another glass? Oh, I guess so. If that’s what you want. Man, Debra Messing sure is unlucky in love. When will she catch a break?
Oh, right. At the end of the movie. Well, good for her.
I Heard Tell 