The DMV – the great cultural equalizer. In few other places do so many of different origin stand as one.

A greying business man in a long black overcoat reads the Wall Street Journal glancing occasionally at an expensive watch – A weathered man in equally weathered work boots stands whistling with arms crossed; the long end of his carefully crafted mullet dangles just above the Boston Bruins logo on the back of his coat – A spiked, dyed, crusty, chain toting, neck-tattooed punker in a ripped army coat tries to stare a hole through the wall with eyes lined in black – Base pounds from the headphones of a hip hop kid in enormous baggy pants and an XXL hooded sweatshirt; his head swaggers in time with the beat – A small woman of Asian descent, standing as still as a carved figurine, clutches her paperwork and stares strait ahead with a look of concentration – A very large and animated woman with a boisterous Caribbean accent chats loudly with what appears to be an old friend several people ahead of her in line – A 30 year old design geek, hair close cropped but messy, tattered Descendents t-shirt beneath clean turtle neck sweater, coat covered in white dog hair, stands with eyes buried in a slim paperback on the subject of personal finance; about which he is trying to learn something – all of these and many more.

We all wait patiently; tickets bearing our estimated wait time in hand. Patience and tolerance is the only way here. We’re all in the same boat; the line acting as our hull. We all stand here irredeemably sacrificing two hours of our lives for the privilege of licensed and registered automobile operation.