Photo ID

I left it to the last minute. I had two days before my Ontario health card was set to expire. Two days to renew my driver’s license. The good news? I could do them both at once. Two birds, one stone.

That’s a terrible reference, if you think about it. Poor birds. Technically speaking, I was those birds and with patience and a calm demeanor, Service Ontario would be my rock.

I got up early, showered, put on respectable clothes, (the definition of which is subject to opinion and in this case, only mine) and some light make-up (still afraid of eye shadow) and headed to the nearest Service Ontario office in Fergus. 

I took a few deep breaths before I entered, so I could swallow the social anxiety that I was feeling about line-ups and the fear that the attendant was going to insist I take a new photo. There was no part of me that wanted a new identification photo. 

Shout-out to the amazing staff at Service Ontario in Fergus. Despite my hesitancy to attend this office, truthfully, the only negative experience I’ve ever had there was due to miserable public behaviour, never the staff.

I’ve always found the people there to be efficient, direct and fast. Not a lot of small talk, just a lot of gettin’ it done. I like that. 

There was no judgement on my two-days-to-go deadline for either piece of ID. Just a few simple questions, proof of address and legal name, then a signature, a payment for the licence and bing, bang, boom, I was done – or so I thought. Then the nice lady said the thing I didn’t want to hear: “Please step over here so we can get your photo. Look straight ahead.” Click. “Let’s do another.” Click. “One more.” Click. “Yeah, okay, this one will work. Thank you.”

And with that, I was dismissed knowing full well, my new photo ID was going to look terrible. She was too polite to say anything, but I knew the nice lady thought so too. She was right.

The first envelope arrived in the mail two weeks later. My new driver’s licence. I started to rip it open, panicked, then threw it down on my desk. Deep breath. My self-talk sounded like this: okay, look, it’s not going to be great but it’s just for ID and you’ve reached that mature age where nobody cares how old you are anymore, you’re just old. It’s been 10 years since the last one. It’s okay that your face went from playful smirk with sparkle in the eyes to resting scowl face with simmering silent rage behind her eyes reserved for society in general. Sag is the new firm. Just chew some collagen gummies and call it day. Now, open the envelope, you vain vixen, you (sometimes, my inner voice lacks sensitivity.)

Bravely, I pulled out the paper, detached the card and looked at it. Sigh. You know those mug shots of celebrities that get busted for shoplifting, when they could afford the good stuff? That was my photo. Stone-faced. Deadpan. Utterly unaffected. Exhausted meets disregard, meets whatever, eyeroll. 

All I could do was laugh. Facial gravity shift, deep set lines from a lifetime of the courage to show all my emotions on my face, much of it laughter, means that if I’m not smiling, I look unamused. Now that’s funny.  

Resting Beautiful Face, my inner voice declared (sometimes, she is kind). 

The best frowns are saved for those who know how to laugh with life.