Reflections on the Ripples of a Personal Struggle in Everyday Ramblings

It is coming on Rose on the flower clock here. (I am happy with this picture I took yesterday midday, as roses are hard to get right.)

I have mixed feelings about this. Spring is banging into summer way too fast, the Hydrangeas are robust and preparing to flower and the delicate Columbines are coming on strong. The mashed decaying pink blossoms were slippery underfoot last night walking home in the rain from class.

It seems important to grab onto and be fully present in each moment as we spin through these damp dark days with the rare but most welcome sunbreak and the extra filtered glare filled light around the edges.

I have been kind of shaky and vulnerable the last few days and the small daily challenges that wouldn’t be that big a deal if I weren’t recovering from surgery have seemed overwhelming.

Out of the blue a few weeks ago my bank sent me a new card telling me that one of the merchants I use regularly had been compromised without telling me which one. I was busy and distracted and didn’t activate it right away and on Friday night after once again showing up for class and having no students I went to the local grocery to pick up just a few things on the way home.

This pretty college student in front of me in line was a ditz and taking forever doing multiple transactions (she forgot her ID and then needed cash)…and flirting with the young male cashier and I got all flustered because I was tired and then when I finally get up to pay for my stuff my card wouldn’t work. No explanation, it just canceled my transaction.

I was very aware of the people behind me in line, having also waited for the pretty ditz. I tried like five different ways; I only had the one card and not enough cash. It was a $15 purchase. Not big. I kept saying…but there is nothing wrong with my card…

Crying right then seemed an option. My face was still swollen and I looked a bit like I had had a stroke.

I asked the checker if he could hold onto the stuff, that I would walk to the cash machine (I had been hearing about the cyber attacks on the news) and come back and he seemed dubious but said yes.

So I hiked down to the cash machine and well, you guessed it, no deal. It just canceled the transaction. By now I am sweating in my rain gear and even more tired and frazzled and feeling sorry for myself.

I walked home and logged onto my bank and there was no notice, no info, nada, la la la everything is fine. I grabbed some cash and took a look at myself in the mirror and realized to my horror that I had blood crusted around the side of my mouth from this oozing I was having then from the surgery.

All cleaned up I took all my class stuff out of my pack, and went back out with my cash and took a bus back to the store and the checker was just closing his check stand for a break but my stuff was still there! Except for the ice cream that hey had put back. A guy actually went and got that for me. They were very nice and that touched me. Then I walked home…again.

The next morning I activated my new (not asked for) card.

And the next morning PayPal sent me a notice that a scheduled transaction did not go through and so I went onto that site and changed my bank card info and a half an hour later an unauthorized charge from a spa In Aruba in Euros came through on my account.

It took two hours to get that fixed that included an alarming call with a customer service rep at my bank that I waited 20 minutes (20 minutes!) on hold to talk to. This is something I will be talking to my congressperson about (as if he didn’t have enough to deal with considering our president is actually a six year old bully and braggart).

So last night after a lovely class with happy appreciative students I went to the same store with cash and there was a black man in line in front of me, a nice guy buying things for dinner, he had on some very stylin’ shoes I noticed. The checker rang up his purchase and the same thing happened to him.

Now this is a black man in America at a time when as a class of people he has been so disempowered and he didn’t argue, he didn’t try to fix it, he was very calm and just said okay and left. Quickly, quietly and unobtrusively.

My heart was just aching for him because I know he had to be angry, frustrated and humiliated just trying to do a $10 transaction and buy himself some dinner.

After I got through the line I saw him outside on his cell phone. I told him the same thing had happened to me on Friday, that I thought the store had been hacked and that I was sorry and that the situation, well, sucked.

I wonder if India knows what they are getting into with their demonetization and forcing everybody to handle their finances electronically…

A world of personal struggle with the simplest of things.

Last updated May 16, 2017