The DMV is incredible and also super depressing.

I'm currently sitting at the DMV and writing this on my phone so excuse and inconsistencies and weird formatting.

The DMV is amazing. And also terrible. There are 39 people in line before me. I'm number D708 and they just called D669. That's not counting all the other letters in circulation. So probably more than 39.

What can you expect though? There are three DMV's within an hour of me and this is the only "full service" one, meaning the other two don't take care of everything, just a few small things that are wildly unimportant.

I'll probably be here for well over another hour. It's been almost an hour since I got my ticket and since the wifi here is super slow I've been doing a lot of people watching.

It's weird what being stuck with such a variety of people will do.

I mean, the DMV offers a view of the community better than any survey could. Literally everyone has to go to the DMV at some point. So you get people from all backgrounds and all walks of life--D670 was just called. One step closer.

And here we all sit because the DMV is terrible and there is apparently no way they can make it less terrible because it has ALWAYS been terrible.

And people have a weird way of experiencing terribly boring things together.

There's a baby behind me that keeps crying. I don't blame them, if it was socially acceptable for me to scream and cry for being here too long I would.

But like I was saying. There's something weirdly amazing about watching people at a place like this. Every so often someone will recognize someone else and there will be this glowing moment of joy and happy hello's, followed by a dramatic crash shared by both parties as they realize together--D671-- that they're BOTH at the DMV and it is terrible for both of them.

Or when the old guy yells out "HOW MUCH LONGER" from the very back row of seating and the three attendants all roll their eyes together.

The fact that there are three attendants and 11 windows says a lot about the DMV as well.

It's kind of like a Walmart. There are 40 registers but only two people working there. Everyone hates it but also accepts it as a necessary flaw of life.

D672.

Consider for a moment: where else can you go, sit down, and have someone from a completely different demographic that you sit down next to you. You share no interests, no similarities or hobbies or anything except you are both currently at the DMV and probably hate it.

People bypass the stiff impersonal façade they wear every day because if you're going to sit next to someone for two hours you might as well be nice to them.

The baby behind me is still crying and in ANY other scenario people would be irritated and crabby with the mother but not here. Not at the DMV. Because everyone knows she didn't bring the baby for fun. And everyone else feels like screaming and crying too. So instead of being angry people are understanding. A woman with a brigthly painted cane offers it as a toy, the man a few seats down makes faces at the baby to distract it, people offer their sympathies to the mom because they know she's trying and its okay.

There's a little girl with poofy pigtails telling stories to the old woman in the seat behind her, they're laughing and smiling together and these people have never seen each other and may never see eathother ever again.

The DMV is incredible. And horrible and depressing and I'm going to be here for the rest of my life but that's fine because it's neat and entertaining and at least I don't have anywhere to be today.

D673.