“I’m sorry,” The RMV observer said as he handed me back my learners permit and a piece of paper. Ashamed and disappointed, I got out of the car with my head down almost to the point of tears. To another kid, failing the road test the first time just meant that they would just have to wait until they passed before they could drive on their own. To me, it seemed like much more than that.
Unlike some of my peers, I did not live with two parents nor did I have any siblings. I lived with a single father who worked full time. It was always a challenge for me to get from place to place, especially in a very spread-out suburban town. I would frequently ask multiple friends or other family members for rides and sometimes I was even forced to walk to get to where I needed to go. Often times, I would have to wait for my dad to come pick me up from places even if it meant waiting a few hours or getting home later than I would have preferred. I knew that my dad did not want to do all the driving to get me to where I needed to be, and I did not want to force him to help me as there were many other things he had to do.
Of course I wanted things to be different. I could have chosen to just stay
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I had experienced failures before but they didn’t seem as relevant to me as this one. Getting my license had been a big long-term goal for me. It seemed like an obstacle in the way of me reaching my full potential, as it meant that I was forced to rely for others on transportation. At the young age of 8 years old, I was forced to be strong and independent as I watched my mother struggle with terminal ovarian cancer. Since then, I have strived on being independent. I was never the type of person to want to rely on others for anything. Being forced to rely on others to help transport me from place to place made me feel like I was being held back - it hurt my sense of