There comes a time in everyone’s life when Enough Is Enough.
One tries to be patient. One tries to live and let live. Every once in a while, however, one has to take a stand and say, “Up against the wall, Imperialist Pigs!”, “Go to your room!” or “No, I would NOT like fries with that!”
I have just reached such a point. It’s time to confront my bank.
I have heard ominous rumblings, of course. A situation like this doesn’t spring up overnight.
There was, for instance, my friend who was left to die on the highway by his bank. Broken down on the side of the interstate, he had to beg a tow truck guy to accept a personal check from him. Unbeknownst to him, however, his bank had just been sold to a bigger bank, a less friendly bank, a bank which while calling itself (for the purposes of this story, at any rate) The Bank of Central South New Hampshire, is based out of another state altogether. Having thus unwittingly changed banks, my friend was now subject to a slew of new fees which, when applied to his checking account, caused his tow truck check to bounce. He now drives wearing a false mustache in order to hide from angry mechanics.
And there was another friend who took a large jar of pennies to his bank to cash it in, only to find that the bank charges a flat fee of 5¢ per roll to redeem such coins. (The phrase “legal tender” is apparently a more abstract term than one would expect.) My friend was able to exploit a loophole in the bank’s Byzantine policies, however, and deposited the pennies in his checking account. He then withdrew the money again immediately, thus incurring no penalty.
But this — THIS LATEST OUTRAGE — has pushed me where no man should ever be pushed.
In my mail, I discover four envelopes from my bank. I know it’s unlikely that The Bank of Central South New Hampshire is dropping me a series of friendly letters, but I remain hopeful.
This spirit of warm-hearted optimism is crushed as I open the envelopes and find that my bank has assessed me several hundred dollars (well, $100, at any rate) for rendering me the service of bouncing my checks.
Enough Is Enough.
As I stand there, fuming in my kitchen, I feel a sense of righteous indignation rising within me. The room gets hot. Crackling waves of eldrich energy dance around my brow. I crush the envelopes in my mighty fist and they start to smoke as I stride for the door.
Children on the street run and hide from my awesome fury as I make my way through Manchester, my Honda Civic shaking the Earth like a colossus as I pass. Birds are stricken from the sky and fall to the pavement with a series of tiny thuds.
Patrons of the bank cower before me as I make my way through the parking lot, their faces frozen in expressions of supplication as I rip the door open.
I stride through the bank, the air around me growling and quavering like the sea. I thrust the smoking handful of overdraft notices at a teller.
“BEHOLD,” I tell her, the air shivering with portent as I speak, “THERE HAS BEEN AN ERROR!”
She looks over the notices and informs me that no, there really hasn’t been. She tells me that I should take some comfort from the fact that I wasn’t ACTUALLY overdrawn by very much money; it only seems like it because of all the fees that the bank has charged me.
“BEWARE!” I tell her, my voice echoing through the air like thunder. “TREMBLE BEFORE ME, FOR YOU HAVE INCURRED MY WRATH!!”
The teller is unmoved. She looks at me with remarkable aplomb under the circumstances—a female Prometheus in polyester slacks.
She asks if she can do anything else for me.
I tremble with rage and sink several inches as my feet smoke and melt into the marble floor of the lobby. My fury rumbles within me — swelling, writhing, emerging from my vengeance-blue eyes in a basilisk-like glare.
Unfortunately, the teller is protected from my wrath by her mystical shield of bureaucracy. Other waves of ire and vengeance even greater than mine have been broken on the seawall of her apathy.
“Um, no... I guess not. Thank you very much,” I manage to murmur as I slink out of the bank.
Next week I have to register my car and all I can say is that the Department of Motor Vehicles had better watch its step!
