Personal blog of christian
writer & fallible mom
Katy McKenna Raymond
in Kansas City, Missouri
Katy is represented by
Greg Johnson at
WordServe Literary
Read more Katy at
LateBoomer.net
Recent Posts
- Try
- Becoming Brenda Starr
- Off Beat
- Scattered
- That’s It
- So I’ve Finally Signed With An Agent. Now What?
- The Spoon
- Sciatica
- Sweetheart
- A Woman’s Train of Thought Has No Caboose
- However much we own, we are all still living on borrowed time
- After all, when restaurants shrink portions, they don’t shrink prices.
- As with everything in life, balance is key.
- Slow down, you move too fast…
- Yeah, I know. I have issues.
Syndicate
E me at katy @ ngenius.com
Funny Ha-Ha, Or That Other Kind Of Funny?
You know how your credit card company might do you the favor of freezing your account temporarily and notifying you if some untoward charges suddenly accrue to your name?
I’ve never faced serious fraudulent transactions personally, but in a way being able to say in a tone full of righteous indignation, “I beg your pardon! I did NOT order the Hope diamond to be shipped to a slimy thief in Madagascar by FedEx! Reverse those charges immediately!” would make me feel good about my finances right about now.
And what if you actually SPENT what the credit card company believes no one but a common criminal could have spent, and that by virtue of your excellent FICO score? I can only imagine how I’d feel if I had to say, “Um….no, the charter of that Lear jet to take my friends to see the total eclipse of the sun in Nova Scotia didn’t just happen to whomever Carly Simon wrote ‘You’re So Vain’ about. It happened to me, too….” Doh!
Lucky for me, I don’t have either of these problems, which represent two sides of the same coin. Technically, I don’t even have very many same coins, but I digress.
What I do have is a letter from the Savings & Loan I referred to in a recent post, the one where I have an old but newly revered Passbook Savings Account. It should be noted here that I opened this account back when my mother was a teller at this institution, circa 1982. Mom’s boss was a great guy named Steve, and while Mom retired maybe fifteen years ago, Steve remains constant as the manager of the branch where I’ve been sending Checks Of Unusual Size for the past couple of months.
Steve KNOWS me. If I were to walk into the the Savings & Loan today, he’d greet me by name and ask after my mother. We go so far back, some of our adult children weren’t even born yet when I began to make deposits (and yes, withdrawals) at that very building. And while I don’t hit the bricks and mortar often, my brother does, and he keeps Steve up-to-date on the whole family.
So, this letter, signed in Steve’s own hand and addressed to me specifically, apprises me of the fact that suspicious activity may be occurring in my long-dormant Passbook Savings Account, and that I should contact him instantly if someone other than myself is making these REGULAR AND LARGE DEPOSITS.
This is about the best thing that’s happened to me this year, in the financial realm. You’ve GOT to wonder when suspicion begins to be attached to a DEPOSITOR (especially when I am signing checks for deposit that match the signature card they have on file, and filling out a detailed deposit slip, and enclosing my coveted Passbook Savings Account Book so that they can update my balance and I can smile with satisfaction….) and letters are sent by Savings & Loan officers who’ve known the account holder FOREVER.
Coming under scrutiny for saving money has made me think more than twice about the twisted state of affairs we—-as a nation—-now find ourselves in economically. But it’s also made me wonder how much better off we’d all be now if everyone’s passbooks had been showing strong entries on the deposit side since 1982.
Good old Steve could have saved a noble sheet of paper, leaving more for the Feds to print money on. And I’m pretty sure THAT’S what’s really meant by going green.
- You know that you live in a economically depressed area when President Obama has to come to your city and make a special visit to tell you everything is going to be all better soon. Now that I am in my 30s, I am so wishing that I had been making regular deposits into my old passbook account for the past 20 years. I suppose if that was the stimulus plan (saving rather than more debt), we all might be much better off.
Posted by Joshua on 02/10/09 at 01:28 AM
- Well I have to say that my wife and I were hacked online 3 times in one month. Thankfully our creditor had put a hold on our accounts otherwise we would have spent thousands of dollars on stuff we never bought.....good article by the way!!
Posted by Daniel on 03/03/09 at 11:25 PM
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