It’s been awhile since I’ve posted, I know.  I’ve received a few emails informing me of this fact and requesting that I rectify the situation immediately.  I was going to post a couple of days ago, but I wanted to wait to post until today, hoping that I’d have some happy news for y’all.  Well, I do.

As you know, I spent this summer learning to drive.  You know — driving — that thing that used to scare the heck out of me?  Well, today was my scheduled appointment for my driving test.  I had been anxious about this for the past two weeks.  What if I fail?  No, no, not fail — what if I don’t pass?  There is a difference after all.  Just because you don’t pass doesn’t necessarily mean that you failed.  It just means that you didn’t pass.  If you failed, however, you didn’t pass.  These were the sort of thoughts that kept running their way through my head as I prepared for today.  These were the sort of thoughts that allowed me to maintain optimistic about my ability as a driver even if faced with a big, fat “you shall not pass” verdict.

Only I didn’t have to deal with that, because I passed.  I got my license!

I re-read the drivers’ manual yesterday in preparation for today.  I noticed a ridiculous amount of errors in punctuation, syntax and basic grammar.  (Do you think the Indiana BMV would appreciate my bringing that to their attention?  Perhaps appreciation in the form of a monetary value?  Maybe?  Or do you think they’d thank me and then inform me that no one cares?)  The manual stated that the driving test consisted of three parts — the vision examination, the written examination & the driving examination itself.  I read the manual in preparation for the written examination.  Only, I got there and I didn’t have to do a written examination.  The manual itself said you had to.  I didn’t.  All that time & reading for nothing.  Er.  What I mean by that is that I learned a lot of valuable information that, although it did not aid me in any of my examination today, will prove useful to know later.  Yes.

The lady who gave me my test was very kind, and she helped put me at ease.  She knew I was nervous, so she did everything she could to make me feel comfortable with her.  After all, she pointed out, I was the person behind the wheel, so my peace of mind was her peace of mind.  We talked some, and she told me how much she admired me for waiting until I was ready.  She talked about how rare that is, because now it seems like both parents & children go for a driver’s license at sixteen since that’s the legal age that they first can.  She said that people viewed that as the time frame in which to get one’s license rather than realizing that it is, very simply, the youngest age safe enough to do so; it did not mean that it is the safest age to do so.  I pretty much liked her immediately.

The driving test was extremely easy.  I was building it up to be so much scarier than it was.  I did end up having to parallel park, but I did not have to parallel park between two cars.  I only had to parallel park behind a car, and she made it very clear to begin with that I did not have to get it on the first try.  I was allowed two tries to get it, and any mistake was fine so long as I didn’t go up on the curb.  I’m actually pretty decent at parallel parking between two cars — I’m even better when only parallel parking behind one!  I got it on the first try, and she was very impressed with my job.  We headed back to the license branch after that.  When I pulled in, she told me that I am a very good driver.  She said congratulations and told me that I passed.  I then (being the perfectionist that I am) asked her if there was anything that I made a mistake on or that I need to work on, and she said, “No.  You’re pretty much perfect.”  So, I take that to mean that I either didn’t get any points taken off, or if I did, I didn’t get many at all.

Then I walked back into the license branch, gave my dad the thumb’s up and proceeded to go, like so many before me, and have a horrendous picture taken for my license.

Maybe in a year or so I’ll “lose” my license and have to go get it replaced.  Darn.