government lessons
Bureaucracy sometimes is a beautiful thing. Of course, I'm being sarcastic, are you kidding? There's nothing worse than having to sit around in an office waiting to do something that would be so much easier to do online. Enter the Social Security Administration and the adventure of a new social security card.
This isn't the first time I've had to do this. I had to apply for a new one in October of last year, in order to take care of my DC registration. It was my first replacement ever from the one I had from birth. However, during the move from DC to Birmingham, it's been put away in a box, and I'm not really sure which one. And, Alabama is a little crazed with the new hire forms and verifying social security numbers with cards (which I've not had to do, this is a new thing… but maybe it's because this is a state job). So, instead of tearing apart every box in storage that I have to find it and making an utter mess in the possibility that I might have lost it, I figured it would be just as easy to reapply for a replacement card.
Now, the downtown office was a madhouse yesterday. So, I opted for the Birmingham "East" office. It was quite a change from the office in DC. In DC, I was the ONLY "white (not hispanic)" person in the place. And everyone was there to do what they needed to, no one talked, and everyone looked hacked off while we were there. But, in the Birmingham-East SSA office, I'm pretty sure every area in state of Alabama made sure to send representation. And what did I do? I sat back and watched… and took in some life lessons.
As the scary looking man that looked like he could kill me, whose fingernails were longer than mine, kept staring at me, this cute, little African-American boy was singing songs into the bottom of his grandmother's cane. The scary man's woman had her kid's names tattooed on her left arm, in about 36 pt font, horizontally, perfectly readable and in flowy cursive. Names like Perthashia and Jameem. I was just amazed at how large the tattoos. Down the row from those folks were an Asian couple that had just gotten married that couldn't keep their hands off each other. And she had some bling on that left hand. A few rows back was an Army man in his fatigues, sitting with his Army son, in jeans and a tight tee, discussing something that had been stolen the night before, apparently while the son had been partying. How do I know the son was Army? When you live in DC and you have family that is Army, you learn to know who's young and within their first few years. A few seats down from them, high-school aged teens, brother and sister, fighting and punching each other. Behind them was a family from the sticks… the wife looked like she was probably on meth, the dad looked high, and the dirty, barefoot kids were running around without any supervision… and as their, albeit cute, little, chubby boy (about 3 years old AND with a pacifier) was about to run out the door, the dad (too lazy to get up) simply yells, "GAGE!" I'm wondering if he's named the kid after a truck or a shotgun. Friends have mentioned that he's possibly named after the kid from the movie "Pet Sematary."
Luckily, my name was called about 2 minutes after the "GAGE!" moment. All this in about 30 minutes. The only part that was comforting was the American-Idol-to-Be singing into the bottom of the cane.
Things running through my head during my experience today at the SSA:B-E…
- If you name your child after a gun, a truck, or a horror film, I will judge you.
- If you want to tattoo your child's name in a font bigger than 10 pt, put it somewhere that I can't (and won't) see it.
- If you look like you're from the movie "Deliverance," I really want to yell "I Hear Banjos!"
- Men, you're not meant to have long fingernails. Leave it to the women.
- Hey, new couple, mazel! But, c'mon… we were about to puke.
- Excuse me, Officer and Son, I don't know what was stolen, but everyone knows about it now, and God forbid that you ever have to talk about a classified mission, because you sir, will fail miserably.
- Also, if you name your child after a gun, a truck, or a horror film, I will judge you. Yes, I felt the need to repeat.
Color me Judgy McJudgerson all you want. But, this is exactly why you should give people that feel like Yankees in the South an option for bureaucracy online instead of having to sit around in an office. This is the result.
I love the South, but after that experience… seriously, paddle faster. I heard banjos.
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