The day we heard that the Greenwood location of the Department of Licensing was going to close there was a lot of chatter. One friend volunteered that it had been “evil” and another told of her existential crisis when the numbers never advanced. But after all those years and experiences, that amazing blend of humanity second only to a television emergency room drama, the Greenwood location closed without fanfare. It was as though they had always been just one number away “this window closed” in every direction.
The State’s Department of Licensing in Greenwood was a rite of passage for almost every Ballard-based driver for the last three decades. It was the kind of place that you couldn’t call on the phone; you just had to take your chances in person. On whether you could understand the clerk’s English or which staff member would walk out with clipboard when it was time for the driving test.
For years I had fairly pleasant experiences at the Greenwood branch, having barely survived my driving test in Kirkland. At the 85th Street office there was a man with big glasses who twice over the years put a Greenwood DOL stamp in my passport, because we both thought it was funny. One year I was so frazzled when I got to the window that I forgot to do a name change. When I produced my marriage certificate at the renewal over five years later we had another moment of black comedy at the fact that I had by then been a widow for four years.
There were some good times up at 85th and I really did revel in the fact that there was still a place that brought together the greatest cross-section of North Seattle possible. Where else does that happen anymore with so many choices for grocery shopping or health care, so many personal cars versus options for public transport?
It was when my daughter was ready to acquire her learner’s permit that my luck changed; coming to a head on a snow day when I thought nipping up there because of school closure was a stroke of genius. I don’t remember what paper they thought my daughter should have had but didn’t, only that the numbing bureaucracy and misleading Proof of Identity information on-line got me hot enough to melt ice on the windshield. I vaguely remember needing to have something notarized before we could return and taking deep, calming breaths.
The knowledge test, the driving test…before the multiple visits ended I had memorized the posters on the walls and done a lot of unavoidable eavesdropping. When I heard that budget cuts were reducing the number of licensing offices I wondered what would happen to all the people who always filled the waiting area chairs. What would happen with so many people back on the street? Closing the Greenwood branch struck me as similar to closing a prison.
Three years after the anticlimactic Greenwood closure just the driving tests with appointments continue there, east up the hill to parallel park, and then back down through one unmarked intersection. Leaving and returning to that beige building, with either a pass or a fail.
Unfortunately one can only renew online or by mail for so many years (ten to be specific). After a weeklong survey of wait times in downtown Seattle versus Shoreline, my daughter and I headed north, reunited again in our fearful quest to pass the vision test and survive the picture-taking that would add a decade to my driver’s license and render Emily “horizontal” instead of under-aged vertical. We missed the building and realized we were already in Lynnwood. Luckily they don’t test for close-up vision when it comes to reading directions.
Carpet on the floor and a water feature in the lobby: it was obvious we weren’t in the Greenwood anymore. Fewer people, fewer stories…just the old man whose license had been suspended after a ticket for speeding in a school zone. When he left, leaving us needing to look up the definition of adjudication, I wondered, if his license has been suspended, did he have a driver?
The woman who took my photo has been doing it for 15 years. “Turn a little to the side then look at me, chin down. Until you get your permanent in the mail you’ll need the old license and the temporary if you decide to go to a strip joint.”
We couldn’t wait to get home but who knew we would ever miss the drama of the Greenwood office?
