The Tale of the Thieving Bank Manager

So... on last Wednesday afternoon I was out and about in hip-happening Charlotte, doing what I like to call a 'bank field trip.' See, I get checks at parties quite often and they sometimes like to bounce. I don't like it when this happens, as you can imagine, since not only do I now have to chase the check writer and force them to pay me in cash but I also have to remind them that I have a bounced check fee of $30. So now they can add 30 dollars to their total (which, in some cases, is more than the actual check they wrote the first time) But the most annoying thing about it is that the bank charges ME money every time. So now, I make a list of all the banks from the checks I received and then drive to each of them to cash the checks first, then deposit the cash. This way, if it bounces, I pay no fee.

Anyhow, I'm in the middle of my bank field trip last week when I go to a Wachovia bank branch. I get out of my car, hit the lock button and walk the 100 feet from my car to the bank. I walk into the bank and 50 feet to a counter to endorse the check. Then another 10 feet to stand in line. 5 feet to the teller. And then I begin to leave. This all takes place in about, maybe, 10 min. As I leave, I start digging in my purse for my keys. But I come up empty. I dig and I dig (there's a lot of crap in my purse for sure) and I find nothing. I empty the purse, tampons and all, onto the counter and paw through it. Nothing. No keys. Keep in mind, ten minutes and a total of maybe 165 feet have transpired. They aren't on the floor. They aren't on the counter where I endorsed my checks. They aren't the counter by the teller. They are just gone. I look outside to make sure I didn't drop them. Nope. Check inside the car, even though I know I locked it from the outside. Nope. Gone. G-to the-O N E.

I will spare you the details of my frantic search throughout the bank, my phone calls to the only friends whose phone numbers I know off the top of my head since my phone was locked in the car as well. Finally, Molly and the kids to the rescue... Molly had a key to my house, I got my second set of car keys and we headed back to the bank. I get back in the car and check my VM and there is a message from the bank. Says the bank manager "We found your keys!" I call back (sure, I'm right outside the bank at this point, but so pleased to be back in my car that I don't want to leave it again) and ask in wonder, "Where did you find them?"

"They somehow found their way into my office," she answers vaguely. Now keep in mind that at the height of my search, the entire bank was helping me look. And this self-same manager poked her head out of the office and said, "No, I haven't seen ANY keys."

So they SOMEHOW found their way into her office. I totally hate it when my inanimate objects wander away and ensconce themselves in someone else's desk, don't you? Well, let me tell you, I grounded my keys when I got home! You have to teach these keys a lesson. There have to be consequences for wandering away from Mommy in a public place.

Here's my theory... I probably left my keys on the counter while I was endorsing my checks. (Yes, I acknowledge some complicity in this debacle that derailed my entire bank field trip!) I often do that. In fact, at the previous bank, I had walked away from the teller and left my phone sitting there so the kind soul in line behind me had to chase me down.

Anyhow, I left my keys on the counter which was right outside her office and she walked by on her way into her office and, without even thinking, just grabbed them and threw them on her desk. I imagine it was like that moment when you are walking around the house with your mind on 50 different things and all of a sudden you look down and wonder, "How did that banana get into my hand?" So when she was asked if she had seen my keys, the confusion on her face was probably genuine. I have no other reason on earth to think she was holding my keys hostage. She didn't demand a ransom or anything.

Anyhow, I go into the bank and pick up the keys while all the employees smile indulgently at me, as though I am possibly not quite all there, you know, mentally. (Which I'm not. But I don't think the missing keys are a good indication of that at all!) Although the keys "somehow" found their way into her office, in which I had never been, somehow I got the patronizing "Isn't she cute and dumb" glances anyway.

As I'm leaving, the thief calls out to me, "You know the cell phone number on your business card has the wrong area code, right?" I look at my card and, lo and behold, she's right. It says 705 instead of 704. So as I begin counting in my head the hundreds of cards I have given out that have the wrong number on them, she says to me, once again very slowly like I just got out of the hospital after suffering a serious head injury, "Maybe this was karma. Maybe it was meant to happen so someone would tell you that your business cards are wrong."

I stared blankly at her as she put her hand on my shoulder and with a bright, happy smile said "See, it's a good thing!" Well, sure. Perhaps I "secreted" my keys into being lost so I could discover this problem with my business card. Let's see if that explanation holds water.

The moral of today's lesson, boys and girls, is to always put the keys in the purse immediately after locking the car door and don't take them out until you are en route back to the car. Sticking your finger through one of the key chains and swinging them around while you walk? Not so smurt.

Especially with thieving bank managers lurking nearby.