Can I see your ID?

It is an interesting thought that the only identification is your driver’s license. If you travel it is your passport that states who you are.

But if you don’t drive or travel, how do you identify yourself to any authority that ask some verification to prove you are who you say you are.  Trust me, I’ve been through this.

If when the request for a driver’s license is denied, the bartender will question if you are some kind of alien. Everyone has a driver’s license as an identification badge. This is America, home of the free and the automobile.

Luckily the Department of Motor Vehicles has a solution. Rather than using your Social Security card that doesn’t have a visual recognition to the holder, but has a number that is really your identification to the most important stuff, they have a Identification Card that has a photo for face recognition and potentate information like address, height, weight, date of birth, and some kind of weird photo that is suppose to look like you. They even get you to sign the card and give you the option to be an organ donor or not.

So the few of us that don’t drive would have to go down to the DMV place every so offend to update our Identification Card. It is like renewing your license without having a car.

I noticed my ID card was about to expire in November. I had planned to take the journey to the local office and fill out the forms and pay my fee and have my picture taken to have a new Identification Card when suddenly I get this weird letter in the mail.

The Department of Motor Vehicles, being so high tech, has decided to offer a deal for upgrading the ID card. Since you don’t have to bring your car in or drive around to prove you can still text and change lanes without wrecking, they have decided you can just send them a check and they will update your Identification Card. Cool!

And the incentive is that it saves your $5.00. What a deal. Allow 15 days for the return card to be sent to you with the updated expiration date and you are good to go.

Of course I took the bait and today I received my brand new official commonwealth Identification Card. Easy, quick, no muss, no fuss so it seems.

I have no problem with the technology and the appearance of the new card, but, and there is always but; the image that was captured in 2009 is not the same image that is 2013 much less the same image on the expiration date of 2018.

At my age I’m not carded very often. I carry it for some unknown reason because that is what you should carry in your wallet with your credit cards and condoms, but if the ID doesn’t look like you what good is it?

When you have to renew your driver’s license, I don’t know if they send you through TSA and pat you down, but I thought this is a pretty easy way to continue your identify; whoever your are.

So I have my new card, my new identity and I don’t look like that anymore. Or do I?