Story Time: License To drive

License to drive at 15. That was my goal at that age. I was living in Georgia, right smack in the middle of Covington County. We only lived there for about 5 months. (My parents lived there for a few months before I joined up with them, having been staying with my Aunt prior to that in Columbus, Ohio.)

It was an early Friday night, around five PM. Right after school. Me and my step-uncle, Matt, took the one mile hike to our friends house, Booger was his nick-name. Now Matt was the youngest son of my grandmothers new husband who was about 20 years her JR. Matt is a year or two younger than me but was about as tall as I was then, around 6 feet and one inch tall I reckon. I’ve since grown a few inches where he kind of flattened out.

Anyhow, we get to Booger’s house where we thought the plan for the night was to drink as much as we could then Matt and I hook up with Booger’s older sister who was 19 and her friend of the same age. Booger was 17 then and his girlfriend was a 16 year old cutie pie, sweet as could be. How she ever got hooked up with the likes of Booger, I’ll never know. I secretly coveted her. Okay, it wasn’t really much of a secret.

Everything appeared set to go until Booger announced a change of plans. And it didn’t include the girls. Except for his girl and his sister. You see, his girlfriend invited us over for a homemade chicken dinner with all the helpings. His sisters friend didn’t want to join us so she took off to someplace else. I was upset because she was supposed to have been my score for the night. Matt was already having an affair with Booger’s sister for a few weeks leading up to this night.

So there I was, with the only motivation for the evening of getting drunk. Before heading out to his girlfriends house for dinner, we did get some drinking in. Jamming out to some old Southern rock, watching TV, or just otherwise goofing around.

We made it out for dinner around 8PM. We were there for thirty minutes before we ate. I had already drank about 10 beers by this time and in fact, I was down to my bottle of Mad Dog 50/50 - Grape flavor. I saved it for after dinner. Meanwhile, I chowed down big-time. It wasn’t like I had anything else to do. We all rode in Booger’s car. Him driving, me riding shotgun and Matt and his sister in the back seat, making out the whole time.

While they finished early, and then quickly took to the out-doors to find places where they can make out (both couples) I was kind of stuck with Booger’s girlfriends mom. I asked her if she had a problem with me drinking my Mad Dog and she said, “Why would I care? You aint my son.”

Bottom up!

So if I weren’t drunk enough before from all the beer, I was getting there double time with the Mad Dog. Now keep in mind, I had to get up early Saturday to go into the Motor Vehicle place to take a test for my drivers license. You could do that back then, get a license at 15 in the state of Georgia. I don’t know if it’s still like that now.

So, I spent the evening getting plastered and hanging out with that girls mother. And no, she didn’t cougar me. I probably wouldn’t have minded. Or maybe she did and I can’t remember because I got really smashed. Only the way back home, Matt and Booger’s sister kept up with the sexual activities. After they were done, she offered to “take care of me” however, I was too wasted to worry about that. Had I known she was going to be so generous, maybe I wouldn’t have gotten so drunk. As it were, I just ended up tossing my cookies in Booger’s car on the floor-board. He wasn’t too happy about it either. “You’re cleaning that up tomorrow.” He said to me.

Speaking of which, the sun did soon rise up and greet the day. Matt and I got home around 2 or 3 in the morning. (We shared a bedroom) However, I didn’t wake up in the bedroom, instead, my mother woke me up by turning on the shower as I slept in the tub with my clothes on, reeking of fried chicken, grape wine and vomit.

She informed me that we had just enough time to make it to the DMV. I didn’t have time to shower properly or even change my clothes for that matter. She was prepared to let it go and give it a try next weekend when I insisted we go now. “I’ll dry out before we arrive.” I assured her. She just shook her head at me. Sure enough, I was right. I did dry out before we got there. We drove all the way with all the windows down. Evidently, I was exuding a very fowl odor or stench from my person.

My mother dropped me walked me and up to the main counter. The officer behind that counter squinted his nose. “What’s that smell?” He quipped.

My mother sighed embarrassingly and pointed at me. “My son. He’s here to take his drivers test.”

The officer looked on surprised. “You’re kidding me?”

No, she wasn’t kidding him one bit. He pointed out the room for where I had to go and I quickly walked to it and inside where I walked up to a table where a female officer sat in waiting and about a half dozen other people sitting at school like desks, prepared to take this test with me. She reacted the same manner of the officer. To her credit though, she didn’t really say anything, just indicated with her facial expression that I was exactly mister smell good. She had to ask me some questions prior to giving me my test and my mother had to sign a paper. The last question she asked me was, “Are you now or have you ever been diagnosed as an alcoholic?”

I stared at her. Then at my mother. My mother stared back then at the officer. I turned and stared back at the officer and she, back at me. It was quite awkward to say the least. Until finally, I answered. “No.”

The female cop rolled her eyes and handed me my test booklet. “Take a seat … back there.” She pointed at the back of the room. She then got to her feet. “I’m going to open up some windows.”

I did as she instructed and I took my test. An hour later, I got my score. I passed with flying colors. I got my picture taken and just like that, I was licensed to drive. I wanted to drive my mother back home, but she wasn’t having anything to do with that. “I don’t think so.”

The day didn’t get any better either. As soon as I got home, I was summoned to go clean out Booger’s car. Yuck! Chicken dinners look a whole lot better going in than coming back out. And it smells better too.

You know what? I didn’t care. I had my license. Kiss it world! LOL (Which was later taken away from me by the state of Ohio when we moved back that summer and I was caught driving. The communist bastards made me take drivers education in school that year first and then get my permit for six months before getting my license. They wouldn’t respect my license from Georgia because I their law required you to be at least 16. The assholes.) THE END.