The One Where I Failed My Driver’s Test

“How do you think you did?”

“I thought I did pretty good. Maybe I could have parallel parked a little better, but on the whole I did pretty good.”

“Well, unfortunately, you actually failed.”

Let’s back up. Have you ever felt like your life could be a TV show? Or a movie? I mean, my family has definitely had a few Modern Family and Arrested Development moments. And I’d like to think my friends and I are entertaining enough that we could have made it onto a few episodes of Friends. Or, have any of you seen The Truman Show? Oh man. After I watched that movie I totally started drawing on my mirror with soap and becoming suspicious of everyone around me. Then I actually thought about it, and I realized I had traveled a lot, including a trip out of the country, so that probably meant I wasn’t living in a giant bubble… Yeah. ANYWAYS.

In general, my life probably isn’t exciting enough to make a quality TV show. (Although, once in high school my dad told me I could be on Alias because I pulled a Sydney Bristow and dyed my hair from blonde to a dark reddish-brown, but that’s a different story.) The day I took my driver’s test, though? That one might have made it on TV. You see, I failed on my first move. I failed PULLING OUT OF THE PARKING LOT.

It’s probably not what you’re thinking. I didn’t  hit another car or anything. I did, however, turn left at the light and turn into the far lane, which apparently is an automatic fail. And sadly, she wasn’t allowed to tell me that I had failed until afterwards, so I had to go through the whole dang twenty minute test thinking I was doing ok, only to find out I had failed in the first two minutes. Which leads us back to the above conversation.

“Well, unfortunately, you actually failed.” Aaaaaand cue the tears. Yep, I burst into tears. She asked me if I knew why (after assuring me there was no reason to cry, by the way, to which I wanted to scream HELLO I just failed my driver’s test!!!!), and when I didn’t know she told me I had turned left into the far lane at the stop light. She went on to ask me why I had done it, and I simply mumbled that I couldn’t see the paint lines on the road so I was following the car in front of me. (Which was entirely true. They need to paint those lines in better if they’re going to be testing kids on driving, in my personal opinion.)  Aaaaaaand cue the laughter. She started laughing at me. Laughing! I was utterly confused and upset that she seemed to be finding so much humor out of my situation.

As it turns out, I had done pretty well on the rest of the test, and I would have passed with flying colors had it not been for the left turn fiasco. So I guess she thought it was ironic or something. Whatever the reason, though, she let me come back the next day and try again.

Don’t worry, I passed that time.

So the moral of the story is, folks, when at a stoplight turning left, don’t turn into the far lane. And enjoy some candy corn today. After all, it is October.

Happy Wednesday!