You probably had to go to work today and weren't able to keep up with minute-by-minute news reports. Never fear! I'm here to tell you everything reported on CNN today.
I was, you see, in a waiting room at the Department of Homeland Security for several hours today to testify as the official sponsor of my English husband's green card application. It gave me flashbacks to sitting in a
jury pool room several months ago, except this room was full of shrieking children. Never fails, any time I'm required to sit patiently, whether it's at the doctor's office or at the airport, screaming children are never further than three feet from me. It's not that I don't like children just because their wails give me a splitting headache; it's because they're allowed to whine, cry and display their overall displeasure while I have to sit quietly. Not fair. Fail.
Anyhoo, my seat in the waiting room was directly beneath the wall-mounted television blaring CNN at man-volume.
In the name of public service, I'll recap today's headlines for those of you stranded at the workplace:
* Bad things happened in other countries.
* John McCain gave a
meh speech on jobs.
* A family of, well, bless their hearts (that's what we say in the South if the truth could sound ugly) got booted off a Southwest Airlines flight.
*
Barack Obama's flight to Charlotte got diverted to Missouri, so he called the audience.
* After two years of pregnancy, Nicole Kidman had a baby girl.
But the main story they were promoting every 15 minutes was an i-Report feature on how to "recession-proof your life." Highlighted, groundbreaking nuggets included using
CFL bulbs, spending less, driving less and trading in
SUVs for hybrids or economy cars. For nearly three hours, they teased a story about "
hypermilers" and how one man was getting 50 mpg out of a normal Accord. Every time the teaser came on, I thought they were really about to show it and perked up.
As the clock on the wall approached the four-hours-after-our-official-appointment time, I started to get anxious that our names would be called and I might not see the
hypermiler piece and could potentially miss his secret to helping me preserve gas on my daily eight-mile-round-trip commute.
Hallelujah! We saw the piece! The nice man from Illinois let a CNN reporter ride along with him as he gave his car rolling pop-starts, coasted through stop signs in neutral and drafted along behind big rigs on the highway. After it aired, the talking heads in the newsroom explained how all these techniques were illegal. Sure, I was disappointed at wasting a couple of hours of my life for useless information, but my heart sank for the poor dude in Illinois who's about to get tailed every time he leaves his house.
Not long after that, Steve's name was called. We were led with no fanfare past a secured door to a nondescript office. At first, before we raised our right hands and took an oath, I was offended that the interviewer neither shook our hands nor introduced herself. Then it occurred to me! She was being bashful, as a quick
IMDB search would have turned up her name as the inspiration for the Angela character on the American version of "The Office." Wow. I don't have any pull with Emmy committee members in LA, but if you do, gentle reader, please nominate that actress! She nailed the appearance, carriage and demeanor of her muse at the
DHS in North Carolina!
I was nervous. I couldn't sleep well last night and, as a result of my insomnia, had a twitchy right eye. I can pull my bangs down on that side, but it wasn't a bother, as the interviewer never looked at either one of us as she went through her paperwork, asking the standard questions. I'd practiced my responses to the questions I figured would bring the most scrutiny, especially Steve's job description (I'm an English major and never took chemistry, dammit!) and why I hadn't changed my last name when we got married. I was fully prepared to respond that by the time we married, I'd established myself in the creative underclass as Leigh Ann
Frink. My standard answer to that question is, "My daddy didn't cough up the requisite goat and two chickens, so I'm technically still his property, not Steve's."
She asked us how we'd met. "Match dot com," I replied truthfully. "How long were you friends before you decided to get married?," she asked. "Six months," we replied in unison, realizing at the same moment how sketchy that sounded. "What sort of things did you do when you were friends?" was the next question. "We saw a lot of movies," I replied. "We went to a lot of bars," Steve added. "
Nooooo! That sounds bad!" I
telepathed to Steve through my clenched teeth.
From there we went to financial questions, including whether I'd transferred joint ownership of the house to Steve (um, no, never got around to it) and if we had proof of joint checking accounts (whoops). Steve and I were in our mid-to-late 30s when we got married (first time for us both), and on top of that, we're from the two most stereotypically demure cultures (I'm Southern, he's English) in the Western Hemisphere, so we don't discuss money. We just handle the bills politely and separately, without ever asking too many questions. We do have a joint credit card account and we're both covered on the car insurance (I had to run outside to get proof and was unable to get back in for 15 panic-stricken minutes, which I spent freaking out over what she was asking Steve in my absence).
Finally, the interviewer asked for copies of my 2007 tax returns and W2s. "Excuse me?" "Your most recent, we only have 2004-2006." I clenched my teeth hard and looked at Steve, as I had asked him last night and again this morning if we had everything from the list mailed to him. "It said we only had to bring copies of tax forms from the last three calendar years," Steve pointed out. "Yes," stern
blonde bureaucrat lady responded, "and you haven't submitted those." To be fair, we started this process two years ago and it was kind of a trick question, but we got it wrong and there was no point arguing or reasoning with a form-stamper.
She made a phone call for us to have a follow-up appointment to present the rest of our documents. We were told to appear at 8 a.m. on August 26, smack in the middle of our yearly vacation wherein we pool our resources with our seven best friends and flop around an MTV Cribs-without-the-bling-encrusted-or-dollar-shaped-furnishings house at the beach.
"I'm sorry, but is that date set in stone?," Steve politely asked. "Well, it is kind of important," she sneered, as if to say, "Well, if you don't want to be deported." We did determine that my work there was done, she believed my testimony, and only Steve's presence, along with my documentation, would be required at the next meeting.
As we started driving back to Raleigh, Steve was talking a hundred miles an hour. "If it hadn't been that paperwork, it would have been something else..." I was still irritated over the paperwork, imagining how I could have put all the interviewer's doubts of us being a real couple to rest by screaming at Steve, "I thought you read the (expletive redacted) letter!"
"My head hurts, honey," I said. "You just close your eyes," Steve assured me as we merged onto Wade Avenue, "We'll be home soon."
Then I heard a screeching of tires. I opened my eyes and saw Steve looking in the rearview mirror, then screaming, "Holy (expletive)!" I turned around in my passenger seat and saw a black BMW bounce across three lanes (it's a miracle nobody was in its path), roll over a couple of times, then come to rest upside-down off the sidewalk in front of the one undeveloped lot on Wade Avenue.
A burgundy SUV that had been behind us as well cut across traffic and came to a screeching halt beside the wrecked BMW. Steve tore Judy Jetta to a stop on the next side street, then leapt out as I was grabbing for my cell phone, saying that he had to see if anyone was hurt. As he dashed across four lanes of traffic, I punched in 9-1-1 and the phone rang over and over, much like it does in my nightmares. I disconnected the call and called again, just as I saw Steve dash back across traffic. The dispatcher picked up as Steve yelled to me, "It's a gang fight, get back in the car!"
As we raced out of there, I explained as best I could our location and what had happened, frantically asking Steve for details. He gripped the steering wheel with both hands and told me to tell the dispatcher that the drivers of the two cars were about to fight.
I hung up with the dispatcher as we drove away. Steve's adrenaline rush was by then turning into post-adrenaline panic. "When I went up to the cars to see if anyone needed to be pulled out and asked if they were okay, the guy from the SUV said, 'Yeah, they're okay, but they just took my money and I'm about to (expletive) these kids up.'" "Oh, my God, honey, should I call the dispatcher back and tell them?" I screamed. Then I realized that Steve was truly freaked out. He said, "I wasn't thinking, I had to make sure nobody was dying and get you out of there."
As I reassured him over and over again that he had done the right thing and that I was so incredibly proud of him, I realized that just minutes before, I was ill as hell at him over a stupid form. Just a stupid form.
We took the Glenwood Avenue exit and got stuck in traffic for a minute. The local and national news vans were parked at the big Baptist church on our corner, where our illustrious former Senator Jesse Helms is lying in repose. Bless his heart.
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