When listening obediently gave me a card of joy...

I got my Illinois State Driving License today. I'd have been surprised if I didn't. I drove a lot in India and somehow the mental driving that I did here didn't scare me much. I thought, a hands-on session before the test and I should be through. I don't know if this term was coined by anyone before but I picked it up from my dad.

[Mental driving is something that is done by anyone other than the driver of a vehicle. Mental driving is actual driving minus the physical control of the vehicle. So you are driving in your mind with exactly the same reference as the driver's, only that you may brake earlier than the driver or steer gently to the left to center the vehicle in the lane. So a good mental driver needs just 5 min to understand the vehicle because he/she knows how the traffic is and has the experience of the roads.]

I was picked up by my instructor Mrs Araceli Villa in the morning at 7 am. I am not an early morning person at all. I am worse when I am made to not only start my day early but also start without breakfast. I didn't bother because my aim for the day was to somehow get myself a Driver's License.
I had about a 30-min drive during which I instilled confidence in the instructor and, more importantly, me. She gave me and another person taking the test today useful tips about most likely instructions by an examiner. At the reception, where they give tokens, the lady greeted me, took my documents (Passport, Social Security Card and Bank Statement) for verification and looked at me and said, "Varuuuun?"
I looked half-puzzled. I didn't mean to. It was just hunger I guess. Or maybe as my friends put it, it was my regular "the perennial lost/confused/ question-mark-face look".
"Varuun! Is that how you pronounce your name?" (She must have thought I don't much follow English.)
"Yeah, that's right! Varun!"
"Ahh! I am very smart this morning, for a blonde..."
I noticed that she was a blonde. I chuckled and half shook my head as if to mean, "Naaah! Don't demean yourself..." I refrained from asking her about Monday morning blues. As it is it was raining in the morning and I don't know of many people who look forward to Monday Mornings at work.
At the counter where the processing was to be done, I walked up and submitted my documents.
"I wish to take the Driving test," I requested.
She looked blank! I wondered if the blues had something behind the look. I wore a blue t-shirt too. (I had a choice of other colors. But...) I have this irritating habit of going against my beliefs and superstitions, often. A lady spoke from behind her.
I figured that the lady from behind was training the lady at the counter. I was relieved that it wasn't anything to do with the blues. Poor lady was nervous. "Ahhhh!" I thought.
For some moments I was contemplating trying to create some fuss just to shake her up a bit. That thought hardly lasted a few microseconds!
I had a mental picture of the instructions that the examiner would give me during the test. I was confident about the test. I sat in the car and waited for the examiner to appear and take the seat next to me.
"Hi! How are you," I greeted.
Pause...
Pause... (The two pauses would sum up to a time duration of 1 second, but a greeting so cheerful should have evoked a chirpy response from anyone! If I was expecting a Driving license granted with a pat on my back, just for the cheerful greeting, I agree I was expecting too much. Surely a happy "Hi!" in return shouldn't have hurt him a lot.
He looked very austere and reticent. "Okhaye! Leth me see yourr thaw-cuments," (the thaw is a pronounciation key. To be pronounced like 'th' as in 'there') he said with a heavy accent that told me he spoke Spanish and was very likely from Mexico. Through the grim look I somehow read that he wasn't going to be mean. I saw in him a fatherly feeling waiting to hand me my license.
"Now leesen thu mee cayrrfully. I am yorr examinerr. I will give you the instrucsyons well in ath-vaans," and some more statements, the order of which I th-on't rrremember.
We moved. He asked me to turn right as we exited the venue onto the streets. I gave the indicator and was well on course. Just at the gate, I suddenly imagined that it was a "No-right turn" sign at the gate. For a moment (nanosecond) I wondered if he was trying to trick me to see my presence of mind. I quickly changed the indicator to left at the Stop sign and then realized that the road was not a one-way. So I could indeed take a right turn there. Horror!!!
Why does my imagination pitch in at wrong times? I changed to right turn again. All this happened in a span of 1 second during which I also heard him gently say, "No, rrright, rright!" I didn't dare explain my whole train of thought. (I have had people laugh at me when I tell them about my imagination. Some are bemused too.) Despite the muddle followed by a mumbling explanation that it changed to left by accident I continued confidently with my eyes opened wider. I was going straight and 'well in advance' of the expected instruction to turn left, I dind't get any instruction. Always the one to be ready for surprises (sometimes convert regularities/ non-existent surprises to surprises) I thought he was taking me on another route. At the stop sign I was to take a left, but because he didn't say anything I continued on the straight lane. And at the last moment he says, "Left here."
Horror! I crossed the dotted line from where I was to switch lane if I was to turn left. So it was not legal to take a left. I wanted to tell him that. But he almost had his hand on my steering so I realized that he wanted a left there and nothing else would do. In Chicago, if you miss a turn, you could very often turn on the next street and turn again to come back to where you originally wanted to. These theories, I told myself, didn't have a patient taker.
I looked through all my mirrors and gently crossed into the left lane. He was happy I watched the mirrors for traffic from behind. At the stop sign, it was my turn to go, but this whole thing left me fumbling a bit. I was disturbed that the examiner made me do something illegal (sort of). A lesser mortal would have broken down. I have nerves of steel (Titanium perhaps...)! What else would you expect me to have when most of my life I throw myself into trouble; I spring surprises on myself? I wanted to remove the fumble from my mind and as my dad so often taught me, "Err on the safe side", I didn't see any harm in taking a fraction of a second to settle myself before proceeding.
"Naaauuww! Move Naauwww! Ptchchch! Phhuuffff! Now wait. Watch. Mooov naauuw."
For each of those instructions, I vaguely remember my answers as, "Huh? Yes but... (interruption. This is where the Ptchch came) Errrr. But now I have to wait (I knew what I was doing, but he didn't have the confidence that I'd stop). Ok Now I'll move." At this point if I didn't move, more than the trailer (moving opposite our direction) crashing onto us, I feared my examiner's wrath!
[What happened was that in taking the extra fraction of a moment, the opposite car who was to move after I took the left was confused. But just before the examiner said, "Now wait" at just the same time as I was explaining, "But now I have to wait..." that car moved. So I stopped. Which is great, considering the confusion. However he was unhappy I didn't move when it was my turn, which in turn happened because the 'turn left' was not well in ath-vaans. I believe that was in turn because he was busy trying to look at the Radio and AC knobs and somewhere on the streets.]
After I completed the left, he was almost at the peak of his voice, "Naaaauuwwww, stop there at the rrright."
"Over there? I pointed expecting that we were just moving on and he was asking me to make an expected parking. Horror! No!
"Rrriiighghghgt naaauww. Staaaappp! Naauuww. Naaauut at yor own swweetth thime!"
I gently pulled over to the side, kinda disturbed at the way things were proceeding. "Perhaps he was trying to shake me up and see how I react," I thought. (In hindsight, I didn't think that made sense but the fuss didn't make sense either...)
After some stern words to me about how things were to be taught by my instructor and not the examiner and how, he wondered, my instructor thought I was fit enough to drive and how the examiner's job is to examine and return home to his family and not land in an emergency ward in the hospital, during which all I said was, "Sure sir, yes sir, yes sir, sir, sir, ..." (I was trying to save syllables because the additional syllables didn't have time to be heard in that supposed-to-be-monologue)
I found it sort of ridiculous. I did my best in such a short notice and I didn't panic. I stopped at the stop sign, etc. I only waited an extra fraction at the sign before making the left. He thought my basics weren't right. "How th-oo yuu stop at the Stop sign? Tell me when you have khompleted yor anser an-th I will prrocee-th!"
"Uhhhmm come to a complete halt, sir."
"Are yuu th-one with yor answer?"
"Yes sir!"
"Naauw leesen thuu me!" And he rattled an animated lesson of how to stop and proceed at the stop sign and he took out his pen and said, "Naauw luk. Thees ees yor Stop sign." His finger was our car and he showed the finger stopping at the pen and waiting 3 sekunds, "Woun (pause), Tuu (pause), Three" The pauses, I tried to time, were exactly of a second in duration!!! He explained again.
"Naauuw. How dhu yuu parrkh a khar daauwnheel weeth the rroad khurving thu the rright?"
"Road curving to the right? Ummm, pull up the Emergency brake, keep the car in parking mode and turn the wheels to the right!"
"Ghh-oo-th. Very Gh-ood."
And after a few breaths, he asked me to be careful while once again emphasizing that he wanted to reach home and not elsewhere. He asked me to proceed. I, wanting to show that I haven't lost my cool, and I am a good driver, said, "Yes sir. I'll give the indicator and proceed."
I followed his instructions carefully. There were times when he was telling me when to start turning the steering wheel. It was annoying. All he should do is to tell me to turn, not how much to turn and when to turn. To make matters worse, the regular traffic would sometimes just come onto the main road though they had the mandatory Stop sign and I had my right of way. If I just proceeded my way, we'd probably have bumped into those cars, but I would brake just a wee bit to be under "khompleet khontrrol".
"No no! They have the Stop sign, not you. You shoul-th go."
"Ughghghgh! Would you rather have us crash into them and then explain the rules to them while failing me in the test" I wanted to ask. "I am just being careful because they don't know I am driving for a test," I wanted to add.
A couple of expected exercises and he asked me to park in the parking spot. He grimly marked circles and scribbled stuff on the marking sheet. I furtively looked into the sheet to see if I could gather something. I didn't know if I was supposed to look or not.
"Naauuww! Follow me tuu the fhoto centhur inside."
"Ok!"
My instructor raised her eyebrows to ask, "Positive?" I half nodded with that 'lost look'.
It slowly struck me that having a photograph take was not for a 'wanted' list but to print on my License card. I got it all done! I didn't even have any sensation, to feel happy. "What was it all about then!"
I guess it was my obedient listening and not trying to explain things that saved my day. My first instructor, my dad, more often than not, got answers and explanations. It was his zero-tolerance approach and strictness that trained me for such an eventful day. I am surprised I didn't lose my cool for a moment.
Thanks dad!