Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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8 JULY 15-21, 2015 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here," as Dante once wrote about entering his famous inferno. Thoughts of Dante danced in my head as I wandered lonely as a cloud into the Department of Motor Vehicles office to transfer title to a vehicle. It was my fourth visit. The first attempt had almost no line at the title queue but I had missed a signature. This was purely my fault. After securing the signature, I returned on the Monday after the 4th of July. Never, ever go to the DMV on the day after a three-day weekend. As happened under Caesar Augustus, all the world went to be taxed at the DMV on that Monday. I planned to go right before lunch hour and beat the rush. Like many of my theories, this was wrong. I did a drive by reconnaissance at 11:30 a.m. The line was out the door. I returned at 2:30 and the line was no longer outside. Full of confidence that the lunch crowd had returned to work, I boldly opened the door while congratulating myself on my ability to master the car titling process. Oops. The line inside resembled a python wrapped around a donkey it was swallowing. You could not see where the line ended due to the spaghetti like twists and turns of the seething mass of humanity. It was like a line at Disney World without a ride at the end. Discretion being the better part of valor, I left the DMV to fight again later that day. I returned at 3:50 p.m., thinking the line would have thinned out. Another theory crushed by reality. The line was just as long and snakish. This time I was determined to remain for the final battle with the DMV. Like time spent in a dental chair, time stands still in the DMV line. To add to the experience, the DMV has spotty Internet reception apparently due to gremlins. The usual time killer of smart-phone land was not consistent. I was alone with my thoughts and about 50 people. One can do a lot of thinking about time in a DMV line without the distraction of the Internet. Unbidden, some lines from Andrew Marvell's poem, "To His Coy Mistress" popped up in my head. Andy was trying to get his mistress into the sack and she was resistant. He wanted her to shake a tail feather right then because "... at my back I always hear/ Time's winged chariot hurrying near/... The grave's a fine and private place/ But none I think do there embrace." The closer the clock got to 5 p.m. closing time, the louder I could hear time's winged chariot hurrying near. At 5 p.m., would they turn us all out? Would we have to return another day? Would today's attempt end up in a grave of unembraced title failure? The closer to 5 p.m., louder and more hysterical laughter erupted from the crowd. The sense of doom was palpable. The air conditioner of the DMV was unequal to the task of cooling the mass of humanity covered in flop sweat hoping for dispensation from the DMV. Verily we stinketh. At 4:28 the lights flickered on and off. An audible gasp of fear escaped the crowd. Were we going to be done-in by electrical failure? Was our quest to obtain a piece of paper going to be in vain? Suddenly, like the Red Sea parting, there were only two people between me and the sacred goal of the DMV desk. I was going to make it. My consummation devoutly to be wished was about to be granted. I would be a successful supplicant on the altar of the DMV. My time had come. Many are called, but few are chosen. I presented my completed title certificate and anxiously awaited approval. "Do you have your completed MVR-615 signed by your wife?" A cold chill ran down my spine. Not only did I not know what a MVR- 615 was, but I didn't have it, and didn't have my wife there to sign said MVR-615. Alas and alack, I was rejected. Like Arlo Guthrie in Alice's Restaurant I was sent to the Group W bench with the unworthies. Being accustomed to DMV foibles, I was cranky but restrained. I mentioned to the clerk that I wished that I had been informed the first time I had tried to get the title changed that I would need to bring in an MVR-615. She told me she always told people that because she didn't like to be fussed at. What a job, having to deal with cranky people emerging from a DMV line. I understood what she had to go through. I would come back one more day. She would be there every day. Be kind to the DMV clerks. They have a tough job. Happy Daze at the DMV by PITT DICKEY FTCC CONTINUING EDUCATION http://www.faytechcc.edu/continuing_education/index.aspx $cholarships available! Call today for details! Hybrid EMT - PARAMEDIC TRAINING Classes begin August 17! Learn the steps to becoming a trained Paramedic by visiting our website today! PITT DICKEY. Columnist. COMMENTS? Editor@upandcomin- gweekly.com. 910.484.6200.