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Anne Bayin is a Toronto author and photographer.
I studied the Ministry of Transportation educational video the day before the test. It’s seven minutes long, for drivers newly turned 80 who must now audition for licence renewal. Strangely, there’s not a lot on rules of the road or how to navigate a megacity filled with construction, motorized wheels of all-sorts and bike lanes. Mostly it’s about physical limitations that accompany aging, with a primer on road signs and a reminder to speed up instead of slow down when merging.
I was nervous about taking the test, although I agreed with it in principle. Who wanted to share the road with unfit drivers? But what if I failed and lost my licence? Something about being tested made my mind go blank. I imagined being given a list of words to recall later and forgetting “avocado” and a civil servant snatching away my keys forever. That was unthinkable.
I love my Kia Soul but the morning of the exam, I left my car at home and called an Uber. Parking was a nightmare. I didn’t want to be late.
I watched anxiously as the virtual incoming Uber on my iPhone screen hesitated and jerked around, searching for my pickup location. Please, not today, I thought. The driver, also no spring chicken, drove slowly. Too slowly for my liking.
With minutes to go, I located the eighth floor classroom. It was cryptically hidden away, not where it should have been according to the hallway numbering system. Could this be part of the test?
Twenty swivel chairs were already occupied. I was shocked to find myself in a room surrounded by people my mother’s age. My mother died 16 years ago. She drove till arthritis stopped her at age 87. (We tried to get her to stop earlier.) Were these now my peers? Gulp.
“Elizabeth Bayin?” (my government name) called the ministry employee up front, seated behind a vision testing unit.
“Yes.”
“Come here,” she directed. I walked forward, feeling a distinct bureaucratic chill. “Licence,” she said, hand extended, no niceties.
She conducted my eye test in front of the others. Blinking lights, read me the letters. Right, left, up, down. She gave my licence back. “Pass,” she said.
I took a seat and waited while she tested others. Several were told they must see an eye doctor and were handed referrals that looked like parking tickets.
Two men seated beside me started up a lively conversation. The louder one had entered the room with a newspaper, a floral shirt and a swagger. He boasted about his travels, inviting eye rolls. Whatever it takes to survive, I thought. Loss of personhood was palpable in the room.
He was a retired pilot, the other a former professor. They attempted to include me, asking what I was doing there. I was too young, they joked. Okay, I was flattered for the flirt, but turned my chair away slightly. I couldn’t get involved in their antics and flunk.
Next, the ministry employee stood in front of a screen to administer a cognitive test. She said, “There will be no talking,” glancing at the men. She held up a picture of a clock that indicated 10 to 2.
I’d heard about this clock part from a friend. It was the exact time of day he had mentioned. I had been worried I wouldn’t remember the short hand is the hour hand so I’d practised.
“You’ll find pencils,” the employee said, passing out paper. She told us to draw the clock (a standard brain function test), saying “no peeking allowed”– she actually said that – and no questions once the test started. I managed to draw a roundish analog clock and get the hands straight.
She collected the finished ones. A few people were struggling. For those whose first language wasn’t English, this was tough. A man began to mutter. He wasn’t happy. She told him to be quiet.
She tallied the results. Suddenly, like a freak storm, it was over. We were free to go. No parallel parking, no having to count backward, no further anything. The employee announced we could now apply to renew our licences, with the exception of the eye doctor people.
There were perhaps 10 relieved senior drivers – including one in a neck brace – in my elevator. We could bond now that the session was over. A woman with arm bangles leaned in to advise me the best ServiceOntario location to go to. I had my back to the door. The elevator hadn’t moved.
“Are we stuck?” someone asked. When I stepped forward, the elevator started. I had been leaning against the panel. Everyone laughed, and so did I. “Happens to the best of us,” said someone, not ironically.
It had seemed heartless, this public way of deciding who was and wasn’t allowed to keep driving. I’d felt embarrassed having to be tested for reaching an age milestone that I could barely believe myself. But mostly I felt giddy to have passed and that I got to keep the licence I’ve held since I was 16 years old.