Yes, I know it was wrong okay? Potentially stupid too.
But everybody does stupid things sometimes. Or how? In the words of our Lord and Savior, Gabbie Hanna, everybody has their crazy bitch moments. Even Mother Teresa had hers. This was one of mine.
So, I don’t have a driver’s license. And my learner’s license is expired. No, I have no interest in renewing it anytime soon, because the process of getting that thing is annoying!
If you live in a country where you can get your license without half the hair on your head turning grey, God bless you. You live a good life. I hope you enjoy your retirement in some tropical island.
Actually, I’ve heard a lot of Americans complain about the DMV so maybe it’s a universal phenomenon that every time you have to get to your license or anything else related to car documents, just prepare to turn yourself in at a mental hospital immediately afterward.
Here in Namibia, there are times where you wait at NATIS from 6:00 in the morning, long before they open, and at 12:00 later, once you finally reach the front of the counter, they tell you, “It’s lunchtime. We’re closed. Come back tomorrow.” Will you be moved to the front of the line the next day? No, you’ll have to wait at the back for them to potentially tell you to come back the following day again.
It’s what keeps me from going to get my license. That and the fact that I would much rather be at home eating and scrolling through Instagram than worrying about being able to drive a car I don’t have.
But in 2016, I went for it. I wanted to get it over with, so I went to NATIS with my sister to apply for my learners.
We got there early in the morning of course, before opening time, but the queue was already twisting and turning all over the place. You would think they were trying to do one of those things where people form a word and someone takes an aerial picture of it and everybody goes, “Oh how cool” except it wasn’t cool it was actually hot and I wasn’t looking forward to waiting in the sun with all those people.
I entertained myself by watching the look of disappointment and defeat on people faces as they came through the gate and saw the queue. Some of them looked like they were about to drop to their knees as they dramatically looked into the distance imagining the horror of waiting in that queue.
When we got to the middle of the queue, I remembered something my sister told me. And it felt like my heart was obeying the stop sign on my learner’s book.
“Hey Jane, did you say there’s an eye test before the actual learner’s test?”
“Yes,” she said. And I forgot how to breathe.
You don’t understand. My eyesight is horrible. It’s been horrible since grade 9 but I’m the queen of procrastination so I never went to the optometrist. I just squinted all the time. And I sat in front in every class not because I didn’t want to be part of the cool club at the back but because the board would just be a Van Gogh oil painting from back there. I wouldn’t be able to see a thing.
If you ever waved at me and you were more than 5 meters away, and I didn’t wave back at you, sorry, I couldn’t see you, okay? And if I did wave back, I probably still didn’t see you and was trusting the heavens that the blurry figure waving at me was someone I knew.
Point is, my eyesight was not good (still isn’t but I at least have glasses that collecting dust in my closet now).
I spent the rest of the time in that queue barely breathing and trying to think of what I would happen if I didn’t pass the eye test. Would they not give me the license? Would I have to stand in the queue again until my skull felt like it was going to explode?
We got to the inside seats. I started looking around to see where the eye test chart was and if I could maybe squint hard enough to be able to see it. Then I saw they weren’t using a chart. They were using a fancy machine that you had to look into. And the lady was telling everyone to read line number six. They were all reading it out loud.
I started listening to the letters they were mentioning. One person went and got tested. The line he mentioned started with “S W M B…”
Another person went to the counter. The letters he said out loud also started with “S W M B…” I listened for the other letters. It read, “S W M B W G C P T L”
A third person went up to the counter. I listened to his line, “S W M B W G C P T L.”
Were they all the same? Could I just… What if she changed it suddenly for me and it was a completely different line? But she’s an overworked government worker. Would she really care about her job that much? Or is she just moving through the motions waiting for that blessed 5:00 p.m. to show up on her phone.
I looked at her face. She looked tired and bored, and the way she gave out the instructions you could easily mistake her for a Japanese robotics project. She wouldn’t care, would she?
I listened again for the lines the fourth person mentioned. They were the same as the previous ones. Then I repeated them to myself, tried to picture them, made various sentences starting with the letters.
The fifth person came, and I said the letters with her. Got all of them.
A couple more people got tested, and I kept saying the lines with them.
Then my turn came. I physically crossed my fingers and prayed, “Please just stick to line number 6…”
“Sit down. And look into this machine.” She said. I complied.
“No, put your forehead right here,” she corrected. What if I had said the line while not even looking properly into it? She would know I’m… I did as she said. Now I could see blurry lines inside the machine. I looked at number six. Should I try to read the letters? I tried. By god, they looked like blurry black blobs. I squinted, trying to see them so I could read without calling the ones I had in memory. I could barely see the S. The W and the rest were impossible to make out.
“Read line number 6.”
Should I try to read them?
“Read line number six please,” she repeated.
“Uh…” I stopped squinting and said “S W M B W G C P T L.”
From memory.
Yes, I did kind of feel bad when I got my license and it said “passed” on the eye test section. But my plan was to go to the optometrist a few months after that anyway so…
I have glasses now. And the license is expired anyway so I’ll have to retake the test.
Don’t cheat on eye tests. You’re only cheating yourself cause you’re putting yourself at risk on the road out there. You’ll think it’s a bike but it will turn out to be a minibus with one of its lights not working, and boom!
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