feliceThere’s a reason my husbands and friends nicknamed me Lucy. Seems I’m always getting into the damnedest messes. But, I do Love Lucy because she has a way of laughing her way out of a crisis. So here’s my latest mess.
I decided to take out my passport the other day, a week before our trip, just to check on the expiration date…it expires in August — not last August – this coming August. I gasped as I remembered some rule that could mean I had a problem.
“Hey Bill,” I said to my husband, “my passport expires in August….that should be ok right? “
“No it’s not alright. It has be good for 6 months — It can’t expire within 6 months of your return home so an August expiration won’t work for our May trip.”
I grabbed my laptop and started pounding on links for passport renewal.
“Holy shit….. I’m screwed, I’m so screwed. The State Department wants me to pay an extra $60 for the quickest renewal option and it’s 5 to 7 weeks! That’s not enough time! That’s not a service… they call that expediting! I can’t be the only one who has this problem? I’m going to call on my posse but I’m kinda embarrassed to admit.”
“I’m screwed…I need to renew my passport anyone know a reliable place I can do it quickly?”….I texted my quarantine survival group and per usual they didn’t disappoint. The responses came rolling in like wildfire.
Human error is a thing. Procrastination is a thing…..It turns out almost every single woman on that text chain, all 9 out of 12, had a link to an expediter.
There’s glorious comfort in a group of women who share the same screw-ups and can laugh about it and support each other. The only one doing the shaming was me about me. God I love these women!
This error was going to cost me. Expedited passport renewals within a week aren’t cheap. However, I was relieved to know there was a local place I could go to… real people in a real office. I was a little less excited when I heard that it would cost me over $500.
I picked the closest place in Grand Central – I hired the concierge phone service to work on the application because I didn’t trust myself – this may have been unnecessary but I tend to go astray on forms.
I found the expediter’s Grand Central office right at the top of the escalator and realized I’ve passed that office a zillion times and never noticed.
And then I had a unexpected experience at that office. There was a Seth Rogen look alike behind the desk and we got to talking and he told me to write my signature exactly the way it is on your past passport. And, as I stared at my signature I thought,
“Do I really make an F like that and an S?” So I practiced.
We got to talking — this Seth Rogan doppelgänger in his 40’s was an empathetic type. “I don’t use a pen anymore and my penmanship is starting to look like my father’s so I couldn’t sign my name either 10 years later. And now I always write on the lap top because I do that when I’m not working here.”
And that’s when it got really fun. I learned what he’s been writing — I learned about script writing for Live Theater performances – I learned about his crazy plots and characters. He told me how actors pay $60 each and perform his stories. We joked while he took my passport photo, I was having such a great time.
When I got home, I couldn’t wait to google live action see what this guy was talking about but I couldn’t find any links. However, I did find Seth Rogan on how to write a movie which seemed like the next best thing.
I’m laughing at the whole experience as I write this. Although I still don’t have my passport, I’m leaning into faith as I await the Fed Ex from the passport expeditor. But it’s out of my hands. I’m just grateful for those fabulous girlfriends and the kind Seth Rogan expeditor who made me laugh. You just never know when the gems of unexpected rewards will appear.