I am now the parent of a 15-year-old. If you polled
parents of 15-year-olds about their greatest fear, I’m guessing “learner’s
permit” would rank high on the list. But I think we’ve got it wrong. Our
greatest fear should not be putting our child behind the wheel of a two-ton
killing machine; it should be the process that starts it all—the trip to the
DMV.
Braden and I made this trip on Tuesday. Adequately
forewarned, we dragged in a large bag full of books, games, snacks, and
gadgets. After waking up at an hour most teenagers don’t see during the summer,
we arrived at the DMV a few minutes before 8 and took our place in a
Disney-attraction-sized line. By 8:14 we
had secured a ticket from the unsmiling receptionist and snagged the last two
available seats in the room. This was our first time to scope out the room: a
sea of tattoos with pockets of crying babies and sleepy children—some teenagers—in
jammies.
An intricate, computerized system called out numbers
and flashed them on a screen. We were told to pay no attention to this system,
which the staff had yet to figure out in the two years since its installation. During
a brief orientation, we also learned that uniformed military personnel and the
elderly would take precedence over the rest of us. While this was fine with me,
I guessed the mother with three screaming toddlers was wishing she’d borrowed a
military uniform or a grandmother.
Our ticket predicted a 12-minute wait. Encouraged,
Braden and I didn’t even take out our books. The people-watching was superb and
could easily fill 12 minutes of our time. Except 12 minutes came and went,
followed by 12 more, and none of the people seemed to be moving or changing. We
hunkered down with our books and waited for P707. Two hours later, our number
came up.
The lady at the counter was nice but clearly
distracted. As Braden rattled off the answers to the eye exam, she filled out
paperwork for another person. She talked the women next to her through the
computer process while occasionally tossing out questions that may or may not
have been for Braden: Do you want to be a tissue donor? Have you surrendered
your license in all other states? Did you try hitting the F-7 key? Have you
been physically or mentally traumatized? She seemed pleased with our answers
and thrust papers at me stating that I would take full financial responsibility
for any harm caused by my teenage driver. I took a deep breath and signed. We
paid our $14 and were told to wait for the next step.
Once you forfeit your chair at the DMV, it’s gone
for good. People lined all the walls, the aisles, and the floors. We headed to
a little open space in the back of the room but realized we’d have to listen
carefully to the lady calling names in the front. It was at this point—standing
at attention, no distractions, fully aware of our environment—that I began questioning
the wisdom of giving driving privileges to just about anyone in the room. (I
confess, I was feeling far more judgmental than missional on Tuesday.) Like the
teenage boy with hair hanging four inches over his eyes and pants three inches
under his underwear. Could he even see to take the eye test? Or the overly
pierced, overly tattooed man with the deranged Snow White plastered over his
left calf. Are we sure all that ink doesn’t cause some sort of mental
impairment? And then there was the older teenager at the counter right next to
us. After waiting two hours like us, he had flunked the test. Braden and I
found it ironic that his shirt said, “Party like there’s no tomorrow.” I wonder
if his mother felt like partying after her wasted morning.
I don’t know how he’ll be out on the road, but his
propensity toward caution and good common sense makes me think I’d rather
follow him on the streets of Colorado Springs than the rest of our new friends from the DMV.
