TheBanyanTree: Who Do You Want To Be Today?

[Monique Colver]

            I made an amazing and fantastic discovery yesterday. We walked
into the county offices of Washington County, Oregon, yesterday morning, and
applied for a marriage license. I was rather stressed on the way there and
kept asking annoying questions. "Are we there yet?" "How much longer?"
"What's with all this traffic?" This is due to two reasons. First of all, I
wanted to know if we were there yet, and secondly, I'm pretty sure that
until the marriage license is in hand, he has the option of pulling out and
running away screaming. That, and I was certain that there would be some
sort of problem, that there would be a requirement that no one had thought
to mention, and we wouldn't be able to obtain the license. 

            That's really three reasons, but who's counting?

            There's a three-day waiting period once the marriage license is
in hand, at least here. It's known as the cooling off period, just like
buying a gun, and is to be used by the happy couple as a time to ponder the
inevitable question that will pop up before they take that final step,
namely, "Who's going to be responsible for vacuuming?" Fortunately we've
already worked that one out, and it's rarely me, so I'm happy. 

            We made it to the county offices relatively intact, he at his
wit's end (and how far is that from the wit's beginning, anyway?) because of
my neuroses, and me just relieved that we got there before the offices
closed for the day. (It was before noon and they were open until 4:30, so we
were pretty safe.) Thanks to a handy directory we found the proper building,
and then wandered the halls looking in vain for Room 130. We eventually
found it, next to the front entrance where we'd arrived. It might have
looked like we were stalling, but really, we were just confused. 

            We were given papers to fill out, with very clear instructions:
spell everything out. Press hard so all copies would be legible. Turn it in
afterwards with a $60 copayment. 

            We sat down. I was given the task of filling out the form as it
was assumed I had the more legible handwriting. This is debatable, but all
the same. I got to the section where it asked his occupation. I asked him,
and then immediately remembered that was not a good idea. He tried to give
me the actual occupation as his company had it listed, and the official
title goes something like this: Lead Tobacco Cessation Specialist Level III,
Remote, Except on Weekends When It's Lead Tobacco Cessation on Point
Specialist, Remote, Or When Supervisors Are Unavailable It's Acting
Supervisor In Charge, Remote. So I shortened it. A lot. After all, I only
had a tiny little space to write in. 

            When I got to my occupation I paused. This was important. Did I
want to put down accountant, which is what people generally think I am, and
which pays the bills these days? Not really. If I put down accountant,
wouldn't that mean I was obligated to spend the remaining days of my life
being an accountant? Good Gawd, what kind of life would that be? Was I
willing to make that sort of sacrifice in order to be married? And anyway,
what if I put down something else? And what does occupation have to do with
being married anyway? Do they want to know I'm able to support him? After
leaving that space blank and then returning to it when I had no other spaces
to fill up, I put down Writer. I figured if they wanted to check I could
come up with an old clip or two that would prove my point. 

            After completing the form we took it back up to the counter, and
the clerk began marking it in that sort of abstract way clerks have, and
making corrections. I didn't spell everything out. I used numbers for the
dates. She annotated these mistakes with what I assume were the Latin
equivalents of "these idiots don't know how to follow simple directions, but
we're just going to let it go anyway," and assured us that it was quite all
right. She asked for their sixty dollars, by which we purchase their
permission to join in holy matrimony, and we handed it over in cash. She put
the license, the certificate, and various other papers in an envelope (among
them, a pamphlet letting me know that drinking while pregnant would be a
very bad idea, which I found amusing for some reason), told us to return the
license after the officiant had done his duty, and we were done.

            At no time we were asked for any sort of identification or
anything at all, other than our money. As we walked out the front door of
the courthouse I realized that I could have entered the name of my now dead
high school wrestling coach and it wouldn't have mattered. I could have been
anyone I wanted to be, and it wouldn't have mattered. I could have entered
any occupation, and no one would care. Esmerelda Santiago, Freedom
Fighter/Circus Clown, would have done just fine. Just think of the
possibilities! Lucinda Gates, Heiress to the Gates Fortune, could have
sealed my future. (Can heiress be considered an occupation? I suppose it
works for Paris.) Natasha no last name, Spy. Pamela Toothache, Dentist
(unsuccessful). I didn't have to prove I was who I said I was, I just had to
be SOMEONE, apparently anyone. Were they counting on the officiant to know I
wasn't a made up person? The officiant, in this particular case, is my new
father-in-law, and how would he know who I really am anyway? (Perhaps
someone has mentioned my real name to him, but if they haven't . . . ) 

            Here it was, an opportunity to remake myself, and I missed it.
This would be handy if I were entering the witness protection program, or
hiding from my clients (an always fruitless quest). And I blew it. I gave
them my real name, and all my former names, and now I must spend the rest of
my life like that. At least I had the good sense not to make myself an
accountant, which may come as a surprise to a certain group of people who
pay me to be that very thing, but that's not really my problem. What is my
problem? Now I have to be a writer. It says so on my marriage license. Where
do I start? And can I wait until next week to get started? I'm sort of busy
this week.