Nuria's Good Day

Nuria (my Costa Rican ladyfriend) has wanted two things ever since she decided that my home was our home. She has wanted a Virginia ID and a Virginia driver's license. She has been studying the Virginia driver's license manual every day, and she has read it cover to cover three times. Getting a Virginia ID involves mostly a lot of paperwork. Both procedures are done at the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV).

I hated to have these things hanging over my head, so on Wednesday I went to the DMV website and made an appointment for this morning. Our appointment was at 8:45AM, but the appointment page said to arrive ten minutes early. So we got there at about 8:30. We were the first DMV customers today.

We thought it best to get the Virginia ID today, then at some point in the future she would take the driver written test. Then after some driving practice, she would take the actual driver road test. She used to have a Virginia driver's license, but that expired over twelve years ago.

She needed to show the DMV several items. The woman behind the counter closely examined the documents. The documents she mainly examined were Nuria's ID (her passport and her Costa Rican ID) and her two proofs of residence (a change of address confirmation letter from the post office and a letter from her bank). She gave special attention to Nuria's old Virginia driver's license and her old Virginia ID. 

At the end of the "interview" the woman decided she had seen enough to issue a Virginia ID to Nuria. Then there was a surprise. The woman asked if Nuria wanted the ID or a driver's license. 

Huh? Why yes, Nuria wanted a driver's license, too.

So the woman printed a temporary document for the driver's license and told us that Nuria would receive the permanent license in the mail in seven to ten days. This was totally unexpected. And Nuria wasn't asked to take a vision exam for her driver's license, despite not having a driver's license for over 12 years.

So we left the DMV and got on the interstate highway and headed north to my home. After about five or ten minutes of driving, traffic came to a stop. There had been an accident somewhere ahead of us, and traffic inched along then stopped, inched along then stopped...repeat and repeat. After maybe 15 minutes we reached a place where I could exit the interstate and we made our way back to my home through city streets.

Nuria is happy and I am happy. Those two items had been hanging over our heads for two years, and now they've been crossed off the to-do list. Nuria still has to fly back to Costa Rica every five to six months to remain legal in the U.S., because she doesn't have her permanent residency card yet. She applied for it on February 23, 2021 and it was supposed to take between 8 and 10 months to process her case. As a widow of a U.S. citizen she is legally entitled to permanent residency, but U.S. Customs and Immigration has been running behind and her case status is always "application has been received and is being reviewed." But that's another story.

You may wonder why Nuria needs both a Virginia ID and a driver's license. In fact, she doesn't. But we assumed that in order to get a driver's license she would have to take a written test followed later by a road test. That is why she requested a Virginia ID. It was only after the ID was approved that the DMV informed us that she could also get a driver's license. Apparently, her old license from 12 years ago had been designated merely as expired and no new exam was required. She simply paid $32 and she was good to go. 

Sometimes, the bureaucracy works.