Which would you rather visit, the Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) office to renew your driver’s license or a proctologist’s office to get an exam?
A no-win answer either way, I know.
Recently, I had to do both, and believe it or not, I have my proctologist to thank for my new driver’s license.
Let me explain.
At the BMV, I was asked to present two items to validate my Indiana residency before they would renew my license.
This proved more difficult than planned.
One document, a W-2, was approved, but when I presented my second item, an envelope that had been mailed to my house, my assigned BMV person shook her head and returned it to me quickly, as if we were in a heated match of Hot Potato. “Do you have something else?” she asked.
The last thing I wanted was to lose my coveted spot at the front of the line. It had taken 25 minutes to hear my number called, allowing me to proceed to the counter. “Can I run out to my car to see if I can find something else?”
She kindly agreed to hold my spot.
In the glove compartment, I found an Indiana Certificate of Vehicle Registration. It included my current address. It displayed the Seal of the State of Indiana. It was approved by the State Board of Accounts. Clearly, the document would be OK’d by a state-run license branch.
I re-entered the BMV, excitedly waving the Holy Grail of home address proof, then I handed it to her. She waved it off. Again, the headshake.
“We don’t accept that.”
“You’re kidding?”
She shrugged.
“But it’s a vehicle registration approved by the State.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
From behind, in the crowded waiting room, I heard an impatient, over-exaggerated clearing of throats. The 20-plus people awaiting the announcement of their numbers had just realized their extended BMV waiting room stay was all due to me.
“Can I go to my car once more?”
Again, I was granted a free pass. Had I dared to look at the people in the waiting room, I was certain to have seen 20-plus one-finger salutes and a collective stink-eye, all aimed at me. Technically, I had only experienced a second strike, but to them, I should’ve been called out already. It was the BMV, not baseball. I worried a riot might ensue.
My second return to the car was nothing short of sheer desperation. If an official, state-issued vehicle registration didn’t pass the muster – the very same document, mind you, that had appeased a state police officer enough, on more than one occasion, to give me a warning instead of a speeding ticket – it was doubtful I’d find anything else to meet BMV protocol.
Just as I was about to concede defeat and drive away, I saw a piece of paper on the backseat floormat. The word PROCTOLOGIST was typed at the top. A reminder about a dreaded medical exam. It included my current home address. I stared at the paper, then at the BMV entrance, then at the paper, then at the BMV entrance, trapped in a dance of glances and indecisiveness.
To present my proctology reminder to the BMV woman seemed about as senseless as presenting a banana with my address Sharpied on a peel. Plus, I wasn’t overly excited to advertise my upcoming appointment with a rectum expert to anyone.
I looked at the paper. The font size of PROCTOLOGIST seemed to have tripled. I looked at the BMV’s front window. No chairs were thrown through the plate glass in my honor yet.
I was there to get a new driver’s license. My current one was set to expire soon. “What the hell,” I muttered, and re-re-entered the building. My life has been nothing but an endless stream of what the hell moments.
I rushed to the counter, mainly to keep others from seeing PROCTOLOGIST on the paper, certain its font size had doubled with each footfall. I might as well have been lugging a billboard.
I handed the paper to my favorite BMV person. She looked down at it, looked up at me, looked down at it again, looked up at me. Somehow, she stifled laughter. Surely, her tongue was sore.
“I need to show this to my manager,” she said, making it obvious that what I’d given her was a BMV first.
She walked a few feet away, showed it to someone I presumed to be her manager. I imagined her commenting, “Well, this doesn’t surprise me considering this guy is being a real pain in the butt.” Then, another person took a look – the manager’s manager perhaps. Apparently, my proctology notice needed to be scrutinized by the entire chain of command. What next – a phone call to Governor Holcomb? “Governor, we have a guy here …”
She returned with the paper.
“It’s approved,” she said.
I couldn’t believe it. Maybe they felt sorry for me.
“Stand over there to get your picture taken.”
I did what I was told. I’m sure at some point the photographer, in the know, wisecracked, “Do I take it of his face or his butt?”
The next number was announced.
My newest driver’s license image might’ve been more flattering had it not been of my face but of its polar opposite. But that’s just me speculating in hindsight.
Contact: scottsaalman@gmail.com