|  My driver's license, that is. I've been without for just over a year now and I can't take it any longer. I want it back, I so hate riding the city bus.
I'll try to state what happened as briefly as I can here: You see my husband and I had light feet for a long time and just couldn't seem to choose a place to settle down. We would move from state to state, live in each state for a couple years or less then move to another. We usually moved in the beginning of the year with our tax refund. We were not smart about it, we didn't plan at all, we would just use the tax money to move and live off from til we could get a steady income coming in where we moved to.
In 2007 we were living in Phoenix, AZ, when we got our tax refund in 2008 we moved to Woodstock, GA. We lived in Georgia for only a very brief time, from Febuary 2008 to April 2008. As usual, we started out in GA staying at an extended stay hotel with the plan to get an income then move on to an apartment and so on. Well, my husband found a job there right away, but then got laid off after working there a couple weeks. Then he found another job, but got laid off again a week later. This happened with 3 jobs in a row. By April we were running out of money and out of options. My husband is from Illinois, which is where we currently live.
We moved back here to Illinois in April of 2008 because here we had friends and family who would take us in and help us get back on our feet, where as if we had stayed in GA we would have ended up homeless. As we have 2 kids, we really didn't see that as an option.
Okay, so you are wondering what all of this has to do with my driver's license, right? Well, shortly after we moved from AZ to GA my car insurance ran out. Since things were not going very smoothly in GA, I did not have the money to go and put insurance back on the car right away. I tried not to drive the car much, but one night my son woke up late at night crying because he had an earache. I didn't have anything at home to give him for pain or anything so I took a chance and drove 2 miles down the road to Walmart, on the way back I got pulled over because that light above my license plate was burned out. At that time I get a 'no insurance ticket'; this happened in March of 2008.
I was scheduled to appear in court in Woodstock, GA in April for that 'no insurance' ticket. I did indeed appear in Woodstock, GA court in April and had even managed to get some sort of cheap insurance on my car before appearing there. Anyway, I received a fine for not having the insurance the night I was pulled over. I was not able to pay the fine that day, so I was told to reappear in court on another day in May of that year. I was not simply given a deadline in May to pay the fine by, but told to make a special appearance in court on a certain day and time to do it.
Well it was before May, of course, that we figured out that we were going to have to move back to IL just to have a place to live, and we had to barrow money just to have enough to get back here. Before I left GA I went to the court in Woodstock, GA and explained my situation to them and explained that I would not be able to make the court date there in May since I would no longer be living in that state by then. At that time I asked the court that since that court date was only made for me to pay a fine if the court appearance could not be waived and if I could pay the fine through the mail or something by the deadline. At that time I was told by the court clerk that I did not need to make a court appearance and as long as I paid the fine by the deadline, all would be okay, I was even told that I could pay that fine online.
So we moved and came back here. My husband has a friend who owns his own roofing business here so he went to work with that friend for a while when we got back and in a short amount of time we had the money to pay my 'no insurance' fine. I got my ticket and went online to pay it but found that I was not able to. I would punch in my ticket information but it kept coming up with a message saying 'file not found'. I called the court house in Woodstock, GA to explain that I was having difficulty paying my ticket online and to ask for mailing instructions. However when I called the court house I was informed that I could not pay my ticket that way, that I had to go back to GA and pay the ticket in person. I was also told that my license was going be suspended since I was not there to make a personal appearance!...This is the complete opposite of what I was told when I went and spoke with the court before leaving GA!
So anyway, my license has been suspended for just over a year now and I want it back. The thing is, I can't go back to GA just to take care of this as I have no means to do that. Further more I don't think I should have to since I discussed the matter with the court there before leaving and was told that a personal appearance was not necessary. So I figure that I am going to need to hire a lawyer in order to get this matter taken care without my having to go to GA to do so. I am not sure if I need to hire a lawyer here or one in GA. I am going to start with a free consultation with a lawyer here to see what they say and take it from there I guess.
You may be wondering what took me so long to do this. Well the thing is, we were trying to save money so we would have the cost of the fine, any reinstatement fees that we might need, plus money for the lawyer, but you know how it is when you try to save for something that comes up suddenly, you get a little money saved, then something comes up, you get a little saved again, and then something else comes up. So we decided, to heck with it, we are not going to try to save. We will pay our rent because that can't be late, but our other bills, if they are a little late, oh well. If we pay for 2 months at a time on the other bills because we let them slide a month, so be it! We are just going to take a pay check and go see a lawyer. We will use that entire pay check for a retainer fee if need be. The following week we will use the next pay check to pay the next fine involved with getting my license back, and so on and so forth until I have it! To heck with saving, we are just going to spend the money and get it!
Have you ever had your license suspended? If so, were you happy when you finally got it back? Have you ever said to heck with certain bills for a month or so in order to have the money to do something which you felt was either more important or that you just felt that you needed to do for whatever reason? Do you know anything about law, do you know if I need an Illinois lawyer or a Georgia lawyer? (just checking on that last one, hehe)
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