The DMVee and Mee

Through the miracle of the internet you can now check all the Department of Motor Vehicle (DMV) offices in Virginia for current waiting times. I decided to go with the 2 minute wait at the office which just happens to be my closest anyway. When I get there, there are lots of parking spaces and no line -so far, so good.

There’s not exactly a welcoming committee at the front desk. Okay, I’m patient. A couple of minutes pass before the woman at the desk filing (her nails, not papers) notices me and precisely at 11:38 AM I get my number: A038. (BTW, I have taken the DMV advice: go there in the middle of the day, in the middle of the week, in the middle of the month.) At noon my number is called; a sweet voice says “A038, service window number 3; A038, service window number 3.” And what awaits me there but a surly old Indian man too lazy to look up (hey, don’t we have a retirement age for foreigners?). He quickly highlights the question I didn’t answer (I am already a registered voter), tells me to try the vision test (passed), barks the fee, now $20, and then tells me in barely understandable English to sit somewhere that way -he points in the direction I am to move. So I move to the other end of the room and wait. And wait (what happened to the 2 minutes anyway?).

I have time to notice that I’m the only white woman here. Really. Although it is not crowded by DMV standards, out of the 70 or so people here I am clearly one of a kind. Abdul gets called, Ruiz gets called, Gonzalez and then Habib. Many of these folks are first-time license seekers and have the bulging plastic envelopes filled with their 5 pieces of identification documenting who they are. Don’t forget, this was one of the guilty offices giving out those fake Virginia licenses a few years ago.

Anyway, now it’s 12:15 PM and I am getting antsy. The woman who had A039 and was also just renewing her license has already had her photo taken and now has just been handed her new license. Is this reverse discrimination??? Monica, sitting next to me (hey, this can be a friendly place), asks me if I’ve been waiting long. We chat about Arlington (she’s a native), her two kids, blah, blah, blah. She wishes me a happy birthday (licenses in Virginia expire on your birthday); I tell her it’s a little early but she makes the point that she won’t be seeing me again so she’d better say it now. We both finally realize that the worker taking the photos obviously doesn’t like to walk to the other end of the building to pick up the “ready to photo” pile from the Indian guy, with whom we both had been dealing. Somehow the photographer finally gets our applications, takes our photos, and produces our new licenses. We say good-bye. We’re out of here for another five years.

PS. I look orange!!! Now what does that mean?