Exam

Essay #1

1st draft

The exam

Everything began on a Friday morning. I woke up and I knew it would be everything or nothing on this day. I wasn't that nervous I thought I would be, but what I didn't know yet. In some hours this would change drastically. So I got ready and left home on the first really big and important exam. My drivers license exam. It was scheduled to 11 am so I tried to be on the testing-institution's area a bit earlier. I arrived at 10.30 am just to be sure to be on time to go trough all the information I would need with my driving teacher.

11 Am. I got more nervous with each minute. Additional to this I got the information, that one guy will take his exam before me, so I would have to wait another 45 minutes. I sat down and tried to relax somehow and told myself, everything is fine. But it wasn't. I got really nervous and unsure if I was skilled enough to do it, because I heard some really scary stories about those examinants and why they didn't let people pass their exams. It was usually not much. Driving a little bit too fast at one moment or touching the pavement while parking in. All of this stuff was in my head at this moment and I felt really bad. In addition to this, this would be my first time driving without any help. Even though my instructor would sit next to me, he won't be allowed to help me, like he did with shifting before or similar things he helped me before. Wasn't much but it made me feel safe in the past and this feeling of 'safety' was gone. These 45 minutes were some of the worst of my life. I thought about all those small things I would have to think of while driving and all the consequences, what happened if I won't pass the exam came to my mind. Actually failing an exam isn't that bad. You have to pay once more for it and retake it after two weeks or more, no big deal. But for me it was worse. I would leave 3 days after this exam to study in the U.S., a country in which you won't survive without a car. Having that in mind I got more nervous than before. I thought: it will work now or never.

45 minutes later my instructor arrived with the other student, he failed. Hearing this I got much more nervous suddenly. Was the examinant such a bad guy who will flunk you for a minor mistake? Suddenly I was afraid to enter this car, the car in which I learned driving, so I should feel save in it doing exactly what I had learned the past months. But I didn't at all.

Before I got ready my instructor came to me and said what I have to watch out for, because the examinant is looking for this especially. So I made a 'notice' in my head and sat into the car. It was a grey-metallic VW Golf Diesel. I used to learn driving in this car for 3 month now, so what could go wrong, I thought. Everything I reminded myself and the bad feeling inside of me grew. I reached a new stage of nervousness; my feet began to tremble, what wasn't that good for driving a stick shift-car, where you need some feeling and precision in your feet.

A couple minutes later the examinant, who went for a short break, came and sat down on the middle