Losing One’s Mind

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The answer to this question is, heyull yes!! Yesterday, actually, I lost it during the most frustrating day from hell!

Now, we all make mistakes, even me, yes, I make too many to talk about. I am a master mistake maker actually. My only saving grace is that most of the time, I learn from them.

So, my baby girl turned 16 years old yesterday and this is a day that I have been waiting on for a long long long time as I am so sick to death of driving her over-social ass around all of the time, begging my son to drive her, paying her friends with money and gift cards to do it, and anyone else that I trust to do it. I almost went so far as to hire a dang Uber for her because I was at my wits end about a month ago.

Well, our DMV has made it to where you can make an appointment so you don’t have to wait an eternity in the stinky, poorly lit, and incredibly creepy waiting room. So when I went to make her an appointment in our town’s DMV, her birthday date was full and she about had a come apart at this so I stupidly made an appointment on her birthday in a town about 50 minutes from me. Sigh.

We wake up at 6 am yesterday, leave by 6:30 am and decide to take the scenic route for our drive over there as her appointment wasn’t until 8 am. The drive was lovely and all was smooth sailing until . . .

When I get stressed because directions given to me by Google maps sends me to the drug testing building for a diver’s license in a town I am unfamiliar with, not once, but twice…I begin to get stabby, develop a frontal lobe headache, and I want to chuck my damn cell phone into the oncoming traffic only after calling Google maps and blessing them out.

Upon entering into the drug testing parking lot again because I spied some ladies waiting for their drug testing, I kindly asked them where in the world the DMV was. They both laughed at me as I explained my plight and that the Google maps devils had entered my phone and rendered it useless.

They tell me that it is in the basement of the courthouse just up the rode. For a moment, I felt like I was in that movie ‘PeeWee’s Big Adventure’ when the crazy fortune teller tells him that his stolen bike is in the basement of the Alamo. That’s how my mind works, it was like a temporary happy place as I thought that movie was hilarious. I know PeeWee got in trouble for playing with his weewee in a movie theatre but I think he was made out to be a ‘self-touching’ example, really. I think it was all silly. If you don’t want to see him touching himself, look away, although yes, it’s a bit lewd, just look away. Now, if he tries to get you to join him or worse yet tries to put it on you, then you have a case.

Anyway . . .

I walk back to the car, kick my daughter out of the driver seat, told her we had 2 minutes to get there, and proceeded to the ‘Alamo’ DMV in the basement.

We get there in 2 minutes, somehow, race through the metal detectors, run down the stairs, and wait for her turn. We didn’t sit there but 30 seconds and she was called . . . here’s where it gets stabbier . . .

We walk up to the nice lady behind the desk, my daughter hands her the papers that her driver’s ed teacher told her to be sure to bring, and we are met with, “Um, these aren’t acceptable.” Um, come again?

“You must be mistaken as her driver’s ed teacher gave her all of these and said to bring them with us to see you. Maybe the form has changed or something?”

So, becoming not-so-sweet lady worker says, “You are missing the yellow card and I can’t do anything until you bring that to me.”

Standing there, trying not to take one of the yellow highlighters on her desk and color the small piece of paper we did have yellow to shove it in her face and say, “Here its yellow, now let’s get on with this,” I took a deep breath and walked out.

My daughter was pale and stunned and I am sure I’m red and pissy looking. I didn’t know who to blame, my daughter, the now my worst nightmare worker lady, or myself for not triple checking behind my daughter.

My daughter storms out and I can hear that she is probably crying as I try to catch up to her. Once to the car, she says, “Mom, I HAVE TO GET THIS LICENSE TODAY! Please!”

Now, I haaaaaaaaaaaate to be inconvenienced and when I have a set of plans that are laid out and they get royally screwed up, I don’t do so well, especially if it wastes valuable time and that pesky thing called money. I don’t answer at first because I see my whole day coming apart before my eyes. After we got home, I had planned on bathing, working on paperwork, getting her birthday cupcakes, and then going to get my military ID with my step-daughter and the Professor. Well . . .

We go and get breakfast so I can calm myself and while sitting there, I know that it has to happen today because the look on her face is so very sad.

We drive back the non-scenic way another 50 minutes back to our town, run by the house to get her permit, yes, she did not have it, I was mad about that, and then run by the highschool where the magical yellow card was, an additional 20 minutes, and then turn right back around and drive another 50 minutes to the basemented DMV.

I had calmed at this point and I looked over to see my sleeping baby who shouldn’t be 16 years old yet because I’m still ’22’ and I’d have been 6 years old when I had her and it was at that moment that I realized, “This life you have made is real and these kids will all be gone soon so make good memories with them now before they leave. Who cares that you will be on the road for 4 hours because you will be on the road with her, your heart, and that’s an honor and a privilege.” Tears, y’all.

We finally get there, just in the nick of time as they were closing in 15 minutes for lunch, get her squared away and by this time it was lunch.

Now, I have not eaten Italian in about a year because I have been trying really hard to lose all of this stinkin weight with Weight Watchers. I’m struggling at the moment but I refuse to give up.

We end up at a place called ‘Grumpy’s Italian Grill’ and boy howdy these folks now how to cook up some delicious manicotti. I was in heaven!! I even bought my daughter one of their cool shirts.

On the way home, I was fully relaxed and all was well until . . .

For most of the day, I kept getting messages about a weather advisory but as I looked into the sky, I thought maybe it was for another part of the world. We were about 15 minutes from home when the worst weather I have ever driven in since I started driving at 16, swept in and I thought I’d either blow off the road or drown as I have never seen this much rain mixed with driving wind in my life. Bunches of people were pulled over including a couple of cops but I forged on because damn it, I had stuff to do plus, I kept hearing my mom say in my head, “Don’t pull over because someone will hit you.”

By the Grace of God, we made it home and my nerves were fried as you can imagine but my sweet daughter is now official and I got to spend some good quality time with her so all of it was worth it to me in the end.

I have launched my last driver and this DMV crap is finally over with for me, praise the Lord however, there are now two sweet wonderful kids on the road and a whole new set of concerns and worries. Thank God for the power of prayer.

Love y’all!!♥