This morning started off like every other morning. My three youngest daughters prepared as they normally would when going to school. The only difference being that only the youngest headed off to school early this morning. Me, the twins and my husband Joe, were preparing to venture over to the RMV in Watertown. What a big, huge mistake that was. Wish I would’ve known what was going to happen before we set the day in motion. Yesterday I spend 4+ hours at the social security office just to be set up as a representative payee for one of the twins. Who knew in a recently done over environment it would still be run with such an antiquated system that you have to “hurry up, just so you can wait.” Getting back to today. We packed in the car after Joe had dropped off my youngest at the high school. We departed at approximately 8:35am and estimated that we should arrive at the RMV at 9:05. We pulled into the parking lot at 9:03 and indeed stepped out of the car exactly at 9:05 am, at least that one thing went as planned. We walked to the corridor and arrived at the registry only to find the line all the way down the hall and around the corner. One older lady had the right idea and had brought her own seat and sat comfortably while we were all standing in line outside the RMV for quite some time.
Looks are often deceiving. I thought with the looks of the line that we would be waiting outside for an hour plus, but we moved inside within a half hour. The line inside to check in the orange or green line took another 30 minutes. I was upset to learn that I wouldn’t be able to get a Real ID today because although I had a ton of documentation, I did not have a copy of my marriage license to counteract the difference in names on my birth certificate to my social security card. That left me with hoping for better results for the twins. So it took us an hour to check in to hurry up and wait. We waited for another two hours before they called the first of the twins. After all that waiting, the lady helping us said that we could not use a photocopy of the name change which I had only supplied to show that her social security card shows the same correct name change, but her birth certificate shows her old name. I’m sure I’m not the only person who feels the difficulty in trying to process things for not only ourselves as adults, but more so for our young teens who have yet to establish themselves. They are asked to produce paperwork that they haven’t been around long enough to produce, ie. utility bills, credit card accounts, and/or bank accounts. Of course the new REAL ID requires more paperwork than the standard ID does. This it was causes the lengthy hold up in the lines. After the clerk confirmed with her supervisor and returned to us almost a 1/2 an hour later, she confirmed that we would not be able to get the ID until we could furnish an original court copy of the name change. Guess where I will be headed tomorrow morning? To the courthouse. I pray that trip won’t turn into a loss of another 4 hours. It’s all just Another DAY IN THE LIFE of ME!
The Writings of Felina Silver Robinson 