I CAN FINALLY PROVE WHO I AM...

...free at last, free at last, thanks to Oregon DMV...

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I lost my drivers' license earlier this year, along with the rest of what was in my wallet. Many years ago, when the same thing happened to me, getting a replacement license was simple. All a motorist had to do was chug over to the Department of Motor Vehicles, lay down some cash, fill out a couple of forms, and presto, he emerged victorious, new license in hand (or wallet). That was then. Things aren't the same anymore. It seems that the more computer-oriented society gets, the more complicated things are. Last spring, the DMV wanted my Social Security Card. Which was lost. Without the Social Security Card, you can't get a Driver's License. And to get someone who'll sign a form saying You Are Who You Are is especially difficult, if you're in an area where Not Many People Know ya. So I jumped thru the hoops until I'd completed the process. I was able to get a temporary license which covered me thru three months, and that expired, so I got another temporary license. In the meantime, I'd sent a letter to The State Of California for a copy of my Birth Certificate. It took at least 16 weeks to FINALLY get it. The Very Next Day, I went back to DMV to get my Driver's License, the one with the picture on it, legal document in hand (the one I've pictured represents the wrong county, but otherwise looks like what I received. An old-format certificate scrunched into the present-day format. Looks odd, but it'll do).

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Remember way back when, you'd take your driver's exam, or have to renew a license that was about to expire? They'd sit you down, take your picture, they'd make up your license right then and there, and you'd tuck it into your wallet and The Process Was All Done. Well, here, in the Computer Age, things don't work that way anymore. I should've gotten a clue when they wanted me to take my glasses off. They snapped my picture, but they didn't give me a 'finished' driver's license. They evidently need more time to find out that I am actually Who I Am. They will compare the photo they just took with my old driver's license picture in their database, and not will they only look at it, they'll employ a computer-generated Facial Recognition program, making sure the old picture matches my new picture in terms of facial recognition. They're gonna survey my skull, I guess. Gosh. I got dentures within the last couple of years; hopefully the dentures won't affect my appearance too much. So anyway, when this last step is completed, I'll get my Driver's License in the mail. FINALLY. Right now, the photocopy they gave me will just have to do. But like a con waiting for his release date, soon, or so they tell me, I'll have my Official Oregon Driver's License With My Picture On It. Yaaaaaay...

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(Aside: my referral to the "con waiting for his release date" is obviously due to me watching too much of those Prison programs that MSNBC airs on the weekends. And I find it ironic that, while a member of the free world, I watch programs where people are locked up.

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It was a real trip, looking at My Official California Birth Certificate. An instant excursion into the murky past. Dad never talked about his younger days or growing-up experiences. He served in World War II, but he never talked about that either. Nine years ago, I learned a little more about him during The Funeral Home's consultation with my sister, her husband and me. Dad was in the Army for one year, discharged a year later, after which he began serving in the Army Air Corps, the forerunner of the Air Force, I guess. I knew he'd been a bomber pilot, but wasn't aware he'd been in the Army before. In 1947, his military career ended. I also didn't know he'd been in the service that long. That was 5 years before he married Mom, and and 7 years before I was born. I have no idea what he did or where he was during those 7 years. And I have absolutely no memory of living in California. Dad and Mom got out of there, thankfully taking me with them when I was about 2, and back then, my memory was even worse than it is now.

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Another tidbit came my way via my recently-received State Of California Birth Certificate. I 'd always known I was born in Hawthorne, California, but the certificate listed Dad's occupation at the time as "Driver"; evidently he drove for some building contractor in the L.A. area. I didn't know that. He'd told us he had worked in several mines in the southwest. That's probably why Dad and Mom got married in Las Vegas; he'd been in the southwest for a long time, trying to survive. His knowledge of mining worked for him, though. He became a mining equipment area representative, his territory consisting of Montana, Idaho and Washington, and was headquartered in Butte, Montana. Mom told me of living in a dingy apartment there with a bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling, so evidently it was dismal. I have no memory of living in Butte, either. Dad drove a lot on his job, and along the way, he passed thru Coeur d'Alene, Idaho and decided to move the family there. My sister was born in 1959 Lake City General Hospital in that city, a hospital that has long-since been torn down. Admittedly I don't know a whole lot about family details and I really don't care about that, but at the same time, looking back thru the years can be quite absorbing.

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A Music tidbit which ties itself, strangely, to the subject matter in this article...in 1972, the year I graduated from High School, a piece of music with a rather unique backbeat (rather tango-flavored, actually), hit the charts...Jethro Tull's "Living In The Past".