So I got myself into a fairly chuckle-worthy situation, and I’ll chalk it up to being my own fault, but it did get me thinking about just how easy it is here in 2009 to become “persona non grata” in an instant.
Because I don’t drive when I’m in Los Angeles (although almost no one knows it exists, we do have a subway out here), I’ve never bothered to get a California drivers license. And why bother? I mean, Florida drivers license works just as well from an ID standpoint while I’m out here in LA, and I do in fact drive when I’m back in Florida, so it’s always made sense to just keep my license Florida-based. Except that just before I left Florida in February, I realized that my license would be expiring on my birthday while I was going to be in LA. So I tried to order a new license online, and it wouldn’t let me because of some kind of new security measures. So I made an appointment, which I wasn’t able to make it to due to unforeseen circumstances, and since that was the last weekday I was supposed to be in Florida, I realized that my only two choices at that point were to postpone my flight for a few days to get things squared away, or to go ahead and head back out to Los Angeles for the spring with a Florida drivers license that would expire while I was out there.
I chose the latter, figuring it wouldn’t be the end of the world; I wouldn’t need it to drive while I was out here, and as soon as I got back to Florida I’d get it renewed in person and that would be that. But last week it went ahead and expired, and despite not needing it for driving purposes, I suddenly find myself with no true form of identification for the first time since I was about fourteen years old.
And now the flaw in my plan presents itself: in order to go back to Florida at the end of this month and renew my drivers license once I get there, I’ll need to get on an airplane, which requires having a government ID of some kind. Oops. I’m not saying it was the best plan, in fact it wasn’t my plan at all, but wow did reality ever just poke a few holes in what might have generously been called Plan B. In fact the only way I can proceed without being stuck in the State of California for the rest of my life is to get myself a California State ID card, which is basically a drivers license that lets you do everything but drive. And in order to get that ID card I’ve got to present my birth certificate, which I’m now trying to retrieve from Florida. I’m told the difficulty in obtaining an ID card out here is that you’ve basically got to prove you’re not an illegal immigrant before they’ll give you one. It’s also been suggested to me that I should use my passport to fly back to Florida, which would be great if, you know, I actually had a passport.
So, to recap: in order to fly from California to Florida, I would need to either be licensed to drive a car, or be authorized to fly outside of the United States. And since I don’t have either of those, I’ll have to prove to the State of California that I wasn’t born in Mexico, so California will issue me a card stating that I’m a California resident even though I’m really not one, just so I can use that card to leave California on an airplane. Basically, I have to convince California that I really live here before they’ll let me leave.
All I can do is laugh. I should have taken care of my business back in February. But I think my scenario serves to highlight just how quickly you can cease to legally exist here in this ultra-paranoid era in which we’re too busy being constantly required to prove our identity to stop and think about what might happen if we were suddenly unable to do so.
Maybe I should just rent a car in May and drive back to Florida. Nah that’s right, I’m not currently licensed to drive 
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