Driving Test
by Gobgob Macintire
Nobody ever thought of me as the sharpest tool in the shed. Not my parents. Not my teachers. Not ‘Butthead’ Kevin, the manager at Ted’s Donut Hut. On top of that, I’m pretty uncoordinated and skinny, so my chances of making up for a lack of brains by being in sports or by beating up the smart kids like John Johnson were pretty slim. Plus, I was in all the loser classes: Government, Geology, Driver’s Ed, Woodshop—a particularly dangerous class where I was known as Ten-Finger Bob. Everybody in shop hated me. Bongo Jim and Timmy Sporanzza were in the same classes as me, but nobody shouted loser names at them because Bongo could throw a football and Sporanzza beat up John Johnson on a regular basis. I was running out of options.
And self-respect.
To make matters worse, I was now 19. I finally made it to my Senior year at Wayne High School, and because it took me until now to pass that loser Driver’s Ed class, I still had to walk to the Donut Hut for my shifts, suffering through stares and points and whispers about the poor kid from the bad trailer park with the shitty clothes and no driver’s license. I’ve watched three years pass, repeating Junior year, and still couldn’t get a girlfriend or even a date to any of my Junior Proms. When someone shouted ‘pathetic’ at me from a car window and then laughed, all I could think was, “Yes, you are correct.”
But I finally did pass that loser Driver’s Ed class. I studied my ass off for an entire summer, practically memorizing the Driving Manual that I got from the Motor Vehicle office, which I had to walk to. If you ask me what the speed limit is on an unmarked country road, I know. If you ask me how much insurance coverage I gotta have as a driver in Indiana, I know. I even found out what that insurance rule is in Ohio, since it’s next door and I thought some of the questions might bleed over into Ohio rules. You can even stand me on an intersection where both roads have four lanes and all directions have a stop sign, and I can tell you who has the right of way again and again and again. I am a genius.
I am a Motor Vehicles mental superhero.
I passed Driver’s Ed with a 100% on my final test and was praised by my teacher, Mr. Hole, who said, “It’s about time.”
Now, all that stands between me and my self-respect is the driving exam. For this part, I can’t just memorize a book. This requires coordination and skill, which kinda reminds me of my days in Wildcat Baseball, a losers Little League for uncoordinated kids where ‘everybody makes the team’...including the worst pitchers. They had only four pitches (in increasing order of lethality): the wild pitch, the strike, the ball, and the beanball. My greatest achievement was learning to turn away from the beanball because, as it turns out, my natural reaction was to face the ball, black eyes, bloody noses, and concussions be damned. Jimmy ‘the Spaz’ threw his beanball low, so if you turned into the pitch you got hit hard in the balls.
Baseball is a brutal, brutal sport.
But now, much later in life and because of that achievement, I understand how to learn a physical skill. If I can master taking a ball to the head, I can master driving enough to pass a test, even with someone watching me. Knowing that repetition is the key (ball to the face bad, ball to the face bad, ball to the face bad), I drove Dad’s beat up Honda down to the three-quarter cul-de-sac and back nearly a hundred times since passing my written until the neighbors complained about the constant traffic and expressed their concerns about the safety of their pets and children, so the sheriff cruised down the street and, with his unique brand of intimidation, convinced me not to do that anymore.
It always felt like the sheriff was following me. Maybe that’s because Waynedale isn’t so big. But if I’d litter on the street, even a gum wrapper, I’d look up and there he’d be, sitting in his official car, with his Smokey the Bear hat and sunglasses and gloves—gloves, for chrissake. He’d stare me down until I’d pick up the empty bag of chips or whatever and stuff it in my pocket, then he’d cruise away. Sometimes I’d just think something bad, look up, and there he’d be: official car. Hat. Glasses. Gloves. In these situations, it was trickier because I couldn’t take back a thought like I could an unwanted piece of litter. Usually, if I didn’t know what I’d done, I’d pick up any piece of trash and stuff that in my pocket. The important part was getting rid of the sheriff. My friend Lonnie said it was a mind game and that particular sheriff was not somebody you wanted in your head.
It didn’t matter—he was already there.
Nobody knew his name. We all just called him Sheriff Sheriff. The weirdest part was that Waynedale was big enough to have two sheriffs...and the other one was a woman, and nobody knew her name. We called her Lady Sheriff. Nobody knew either one of them. They weren’t social, I guess. We thought they might be from Ohio, which is always a scary thought. We also guessed that they were together, but nobody was sure. A guy I know told me Sheriff Sheriff was seen at the Methodist church one Sunday, so he might be a Methodist. But he might have just been there so he could watch everybody...somebody just spying on the Methodists, which also makes sense unless he’s from Ohio. I also heard a theory that there aren’t any actual sheriffs for Waynedale, and that the two of them are just vigilantes with sheriff costumes. All I know is – and just to be on the safe side – I take them as the real law.
Before Sheriff Sheriff shut down my practice route, I already felt like I was in command of the Honda. Sometimes, as I passed the blue doublewide that Rhonda Gharmshon lived in, she’d wave to me from the porch and smile. If she hadn’t been attending a different high school, she would have had the potential for being a prom date—a Senior Prom date this year. Now that she sees me driving instead of walking, everything feels different.
But I have to stay focused. Nothing matters now, not eating or school or even the smiles I was getting from Rhonda—nothing was more important than passing the driving test! It was, in fact, her smiles and new attitude that helped me to ignore her and focus on my driving. I tried to tell myself that by terminating my practice-driving route, the Sheriff had given me a gift. Now I wouldn’t see that fancy robin’s-egg-blue doublewide – or Rhonda – until I had my license, and maybe she would start to wonder where I had gone, maybe even be concerned about my health, or ask around whether I was seeing somebody else. It was an easy fantasy to buy into, so I did.
My new approach was to focus on the finer points of Honda control: backing up, adjusting mirrors, fluid levels, tire pressure, and the mother of all driving maneuvers, parallel parking. Parallel parking was dead in Waynedale. Everything was driveways and parking lots, so I wasn’t expecting it to be on the test, but I felt like if I knew that, nothing could throw me, everything else would be unthinkably easy—the same reason I memorized certain motor vehicle rules for Ohio. It was tough to find a place close enough to our trailer to work my moves without drawing the attention of either the neighbors or Waynedale’s law enforcement community. Curb parking wasn’t allowed in our subdivision. I think they were afraid some of the more yahoo types would make it a habit of dropping their trannies there on the street and send the reputation of an otherwise respectable trailer park to hell.
The people living here weren’t like the people who lived in Avalon near the Middle School. Mrs. Flostein, next door, was about a million years old and never moved her car or even wandered outside, except to collect her Publishers Clearinghouse paraphernalia from the mailbox. My friend Lonnie thought she was dead, so I dragged her doghouse off her driveway, pulled up next to her Dodge, and experimented with paralleling. Back up, turn, turn, stop. Back up, turn, turn, stop. After three solid weeks of practicing, Mrs. Flostein floated to the door with her nose tubes and oxygen tank and seemed really agitated. She was turning red, so I just backed out of her drive and retreated to our trailer.
I had to take a break anyway to talk Dad into topping off the Honda so I could keep going. All gassed, up I cautiously returned, but either Sheriff Sheriff or Lady Sheriff – sometimes I can’t tell—was sitting in Mrs. Flostein’s drive, so I decided practice was over.
Didn’t matter. I knew I was ready.
#
Today, I stand next to the Honda waiting for the Motor Vehicles examiner who will test me, pass me, and change my life forever. I feel the same way I felt the day of the written exam—the last one, the one that I passed. I feel like there is nothing my examiner can ask of me that I would even hesitate to do, and do well. Even parallel parking.
The day is clear. The sun is bright. But it’s very cold and insanely windy. I had to bundle up extra and wear a ski mask to scrape last night’s ice off the windows. I must have five layers on right now to be able to stand this cold. I’m wearing so many layers that when I have to go to the bathroom, I almost don’t find my junk in time. In spite of the cold, I stand outside of the car and let the wind chill my face and keep my senses sharp. The remainder of Waynedale’s licensed drivers dutifully maneuver their vehicles here and there like obedient colony members of a giant ant farm. I seem to be the only human craving this next victory, my upcoming freedom.
I am alive!
A man with a clipboard hurries out of Motor Vehicles and approaches me. “What’s your name?” he asks.
An easy question to start this test off. “Bob,” I say, which I know is correct.
“Yeah. Okay, Bob. Get into the car and start her up.”
“Yes, sir.”
I suppose I should have asked his name. Thinking back, that would have helped quite a bit. But I’m not thinking of that right now. I open the door for him, slam it shut, move to my side, get in and plunge the key into the ignition. Before I start the engine, I make a big deal about pulling the seat belt across me and latching it, then I start to check my mirrors.
“Let’s get going,” Mr. Examiner coughs at me.
Another official, again with a clipboard, comes up to the car as I’m pulling out and waves at us, but as I start to hit the brakes, Mr. Examiner coughs again.
“I owe that guy money, just go.”
Fair enough, Mr. Examiner. For the length of this road test, I am your servant, you are my everything – but not in a romantic creepy way – and your wishes are my commands. If I am to pass this test and move on with the entire rest of my life, what you say, I do, no matter how complex or ridiculous. I can’t question what you say to me. I understand this relationship, and I feel like you do, too. Off I go. At the exit from the Motor Vehicles parking lot, I prepare myself for a right-hand turn onto Lower Huntington Road. I flip on the turn signal.
“Kid.”
I gulp.
“There’s nobody behind you and nobody coming. Screw the turn signal and let’s get moving.”
My balls tighten up into my body, like when I climb to the top of a ladder and it’s windy, or when dad tailgates on the interstate during a rainstorm. I try to relax. This isn’t even parallel parking. If I panic now, I’m finished, and that’s it for freedom from my parents and a possible date with Rhonda to the Senior Prom and any chance of respect from anyone at the Donut Hut.
I reach inside my mind, unleash my inner Jedi, and chill myself down. I turn off the turn signal and pull out onto the street as if it were as easy for me as pitching stale donuts.
I stop at the light.
“Good move. Not too fast,” he says. ‘Good move’ I get – it was an awesome turn – but ‘Not too fast’ is like he isn’t paying attention. Could it be a diversion? I’m stopped at a light. The car isn’t moving. What could he mean by ‘Not too fast?’
I push down on the brake pedal even harder.
“Take a left here and pull into that parking lot.”
It’s the bank lot, and there are cars parked in most of the spaces, but also along the curb of the drive. I notice a gap in the cars along the curb. The gap was maybe big enough for the Honda, but it would be like threading a needle. This must be the surprise bomb that he springs on other drivers... the innocent, the unaware. He was about to force me to parallel park in the most unexpected place—a parking lot. Not prepare me for it, or ease me into it, but just spring it on me like I lived in New York City or Sandusky, as if I really need to know how to do this. He had a glint in his eye, and I could tell that he imbibed his greatest pleasure, not from how many souls he granted freedom, but from how many he could fail. It was a sobering moment in that Honda, but I was not going to crack.
I’m sure he could sense my confidence and changed plans almost immediately. “Park there,” he said, pointing to the handicapped space at the door of the bank. This was a clever move. Do I disobey orders, or do I fall for the misleading direction and break the law? Instead of refusing outright, I suggest pulling into a space away from the door, one that didn’t require the handicapped tag. A great move on my part. Mr. Examiner has no choice but to heap his praise on me saying, “Yeah, cool.”
I ease the Honda to a complete stop, but this is not the end. I had thought that a parallel parking was going down, and the worst would be over, but I know now that I am dealing with a master. Mr. Examiner knew how to draw out the torture. Where would we go next? Did he have a set obstacle course that he tortured driving hopefuls with? Or was he so slick that he just winged it and let the drivers make the mistakes, cracking under his mind games?
“Wait here,” he says to me, then heaves himself out of the car and, sensing how frightfully cold it is, slips on his ski cap. Almost as an afterthought, he leans back and says, “Pop the trunk.” I do. He slams the door and marches off into the bank.
So, this is how the driving exam game is played. Let the driver stew in his own nerves, and then spring all of the right turns and left turns and parallel parkings on him after. Weed out the weak. He was probably in there talking to a buddy and telling him about how he had another loser trying to get a license and just needed to make him sweat for a while. But he did not know who he was dealing with.
I was ready and steady.
I decided to use the time productively. Review the controls. Check the mirrors. Do an imaginary parallel parking move: back up, turn, turn, stop. Go over various rules, like the stop sign stuff. I take myself to an imaginary complex intersection. I see myself standing on one of the corners with a bullhorn. The cars roll up to the intersection with almost blinding speed, but I look at them all and shout through the bullhorn, “You go!” and “You go!” and “You go!” They heed my commands, and everyone traveling through the intersection is safe. I bring myself back to the Honda and our current affairs. It feels good. I still have it. It’s all in there in my brain. I am a genius. I am alive!
It’s noon, and the volunteer fire department’s siren test starts to blare. Mr. Examiner hurries out of the bank, tosses a bag in the trunk with a loud thump, and plops himself down in the passenger’s seat. I keep calm and steady. I had kept the engine running because he had not told me to park, only to pull into the space—I knew the difference. I could handle any order he gave me. I was going to pass my test!
“Head out of the parking lot and take a right.”
Yes. Easy. No parking. Moving. That’s exactly what I was ready for. I turn right. I stop at the light.
“Right turn on red,” he says, poking me in the side.
Shit. I knew that. Fine. Couldn’t be a point against me. Quit thinking, Bob. Just drive. Follow orders, and soon you will be free. I noticed he wasn’t making any notes on the clipboard, so all was good.
I turn right onto Old Trail Road. He is very quiet. I can still hear the noon siren and the sound of the train headed for Yoder. He keeps quiet. I wait for his next order. We come to a T and he has me take a right onto Bluffton. Then, he is silent. There must be a strategy to it. A mind game. But I think, You are an amateur, sir. You have no idea how prepared I am for this.
“Pull onto the interstate.”
“What?”
“The interstate! Now! Go!”
I yank the wheel to the right and hit the cloverleaf hard. As I’m winding my way around the on-ramp, trying to stay under the speed limit, I notice that the noon siren is still wailing, though not from the volunteer fire department, but from the car of Sheriff Sheriff directly behind me. I can’t think. Do I pull off and stop, or do I get all the way to the highway and then slow to let him pass? Suddenly, I can’t remember anything in the Driver’s Manual. Shit.
“Speed up, kid.”
Answer. Yes. Like the Driver’s Manual itself speaking directly to me. Thank you. I’ll speed up and get out of the way. I push my foot to the floor and glance over to my passenger, who has slumped down into the seat, almost out of sight. He’s smiling. He likes my driving. The license will be mine!
As I finish with the on-ramp and merge onto the interstate, Sherriff Sheriff doesn’t seem like he is going to pass. He blurps the siren and starts to say something into the loudspeaker, but my examiner yells over him, “FASTER!”
I start to push down on the gas, then I hesitate. “We’re going the speed limit now.”
“This sheriff does this all the time when I’m doing these exams. Hit the gas. He’ll get a kick out of it.”
Pedal to the metal and the Honda groans up to seventy, seventy-five. Sheriff Sheriff pulls up next to us as if we are standing still. My knuckles are digging into the fake leather of the steering wheel. The Honda shakes almost uncontrollably. Pieces of rust that are being battered by the shaking and high wind are starting to break off the car and fly around, causing drivers behind us to swerve.
“Off-ramp! NOW!”
I yank the wheel to the right again. Sheriff Sheriff holds his position next to me like we’re fighter jets in formation. I look at him, and he looks at me and only me; not his dash, not the sky, not the earth. Me. That is, until he finally glances back at the road and notices there’s only so much space on an off-ramp, and is forced to swerve off and down the embankment and out of sight.
My attention is focused back on the road where it turns to the left just in front of me... a turn the Honda won’t be making. Instead, we follow the uphill trajectory we are on.
We are airborne.
The Honda is still. Time does not pass. I look at my passenger, and I see that he is still slumped way down in his seat, but now he also seems to be screaming and bracing himself against the dashboard. There is no sound right now. I only assume he is screaming because of the whiteness of his face, the open cavern of his mouth, and his wide, unblinking, tear-filled eyes.
In front of us and a bit below stands the guardrail of the highway overpass. If I had time, I would shit myself.
We clear the guardrail.
Almost.
The rear bumper catches the rail just enough to whip us in the correct direction and send us along the crossing highway—the most amazing left turn in the history of car driving, but the bumper is halfway pulled off the car. We hit the road smoothly, along with half of the bumper. Sparks fly from the back of the car. We are free from the hot pursuit of Sheriff Sheriff, and we ease on down the road like a Fourth of July parade float. If we had been in a Pinto we would have blown up by now.
I try to talk over the noise of the dragging bumper, “I should pull over, right?”
“Keep driving, kid!”
“But…!”
“You want your license?”
“Sure!”
“Keep driving!”
We spend the next 45 minutes at a much calmer speed so as not to attract attention, meandering through some of the worst roads in the county, most I had never even heard of. Compared to where we were now, Waynedale was a sophisticated metropolis.
At one point, he has me turn onto a dirt path weaving through a field. The giant tractor treads have transformed a half-mile of frozen ground into low-pitched rumble strips.
The steady groan of the Honda ends with a final ‘whump’ as the rear bumper bids us farewell, and we leap back onto a paved road.
“Straight ahead,” says the examiner, and I obey. I take note of the crossroad—Thiele Road, who would name a road Thiele?—so I can come back and get the bumper after the exam is finished. Dad is going to kill me for all this damage. Any more off-road driving and I’ll be returning a set of wheels, an engine, and the skeletal remains of this old car – a Honda Dune Buggy. But maybe he’ll cool off if he knows it all happened during the driving exam...and that I passed the exam.
Mr. Examiner seems to be in good spirits now, so in spite of the Dukes of Hazard stunts, my chances for passing appear good. Though I had expected this exam to be pretty short and that we wouldn’t even leave Waynedale, right now, I don’t even know if I can find my way back to the trailer park.
After a few more rights and lefts, he finally says, “Okay, kid, that’s it. Pull over here.”
That’s it? Really?! We’re at a grain elevator next to the railroad tracks in some small town. Country roads, no parallel parking, and it ends in the middle of nowhere? He must live out here. He just made me drive him home!
At the grain elevator, there’s a row of trucks parked next to the road. I pull up next to the last one and unleash my talent: Backup, turn, turn, stop. Perfect parallel parking form. I look at him with a smirk.
He laughs.
“Not bad, kid. This went better than I thought.”
“So, I passed? I get my license?”
“License, right.”
Almost like he forgot about the clipboard, he laughs again and signs some sheet on the clipboard. “Turn this in at the Bureau, and they’ll take you through the rest of the paperwork. Pop the trunk.”
I’m over the top with excitement. I’ll have my license at last! He ambles out, grabs his bag from the back, closes the trunk and waves goodbye. Then he walks over to the elevator office and waves to a couple of farmers standing there. They wave back at him but look confused and turn back to their conversation. Then he trots over to the train and climbs into one of the boxcars. He gives me a wave. I wave back. The train creeps along, and he is out of sight.
Climbs into a boxcar?
Whatever.
I do not care.
My next destination is the Bureau of Motor Vehicles in Waynedale.
I look around, not sure exactly where I am, and I have no idea how we got here. He had me so turned around with all the lefts and rights that there’s no way I could repeat that route. I can see a water tower near the town, so I check out the name: Van Wert.
Van Wert? That means I’m in Ohio. Holy shit. I thought we were traveling in circles, but we were heading east the whole time. I head into the middle of Van Wert, locate 224 and start heading back home. Now all I can think about (in addition to having my license) is where the rear bumper is: Ohio or Indiana?
About 10 minutes into my return drive, I can see up ahead that the road is blocked. Cops. My side is moving, though slowly, but the other side is really backed up. There’s no accident on the road. It must have been cleared already. Must have been huge, though, for this big of a backup. Officers are lined up and down the center line waving us along. Then I recognize one of them. Sheriff Sheriff! He sees me and he starts screaming:
“It’s him! Son of a bitch! It’s him! Stop! Stop! Goddamnit he’s coming from Ohio! He already got through.”
I stop the car just past the roadblock, near his sheriff-mobile. He savagely opens my door, nearly ripping it off its delicate rusted hinges. As I start to climb out, he grabs me by my coat, flips me around, and slams me against the Honda. Through the many layers of clothes, I can feel another set of hands on me, either frisking or molesting, depending on your definition, and I hear a low – but clearly female – groaning chuckle, like the sound of wet gravel thrown against a dry cardboard box, and I know that it’s Lady Sheriff. The entire Waynedale police force has been unleashed to bring me in from my driving exam. I am at their mercy. I hear the clicking of handcuffs opening and then the very harsh feel of them snapping around my wrists.
“You stupid son of a bitch,” Sheriff Sheriff snarls at me, “If you made it to Ohio, why the hell would you come back?”
All I can think to say is, “I had to get my bumper.”
#
It is strange to me how jail time allows a person to reflect on the past and all the moments where better choices might have beget better outcomes. But too much reflection can lead to crazy, and I am not crazy—just ask all my new friends, friends that I never expected to have back when I was taking my driving test. None of us minded prison too much, and none of us were missed by the rest of the world. All our sentences meant was that a minimum wage job somewhere went unfilled for 5-7 years.
I finished my high schooling in prison, though there wasn’t a senior prom. Well, nothing official or that I would tell anyone about. I even met my examiner a few years later when I was transferred to a facility in Kansas. His name was Merica (like America without the A). Mr. Merica had finally been caught in Muskegon, and my sentence in Indiana was reduced, though I still was, technically, driving the getaway car.
Now I am older, wiser, learned. In addition to my genius at parallel parking, I can also weld and fix VCR machines. Indeed, the road ahead is bright; I have my old Honda, my new friends, and – once again – my freedom.
Oh, and my driver’s license.
I am alive!
~~~
