That Time I Went to The Social Security Office

Ready to get the mounds of paperwork done in order to legally become Mrs. F, just days after our honeymoon I set off to the Social Security office, documents and the application in hand! What I thought would be a quick, drop-by then leave kind of errand turned into being so much...worse. 

Little did I know everybody and their brother decided to do the same thing that Wednesday morning. The parking lot was deceiving as I got a spot out front. I grabbed my coffee mug and my purse and walked inside. 

"MA'AM YOU CANNOT BRING DRINKS INSIDE! Read the sign!" Well good morning to you, too. I hadn't even entered the actual building and I was already being yelled at by a grumpy security guard. Only with 2 or 3 tears in my eyes and shaking just a little in my shoes, I walked back to my car and left my caffeinated drink inside. Clearly she did not know how much Loomis people need that precious liquid gold to survive through the day. But whatever. 

I gathered up my courage and walked back in, thankfully the security lady had moved so I didn't encounter her, and for a moment I just stood there. People. Were. Everywhere. What exactly was I supposed to do? Apparently being an adult means knowing all of the rules and courses of action before you ever enter. I followed the person who came in right before me and checked in at a kiosk (nowhere near the entrance). My number was 130. The desks were calling numbers in the 70s. They insisted over announcements that even though there was a general order, they said "urgent" cases would be pushed ahead. Somehow getting married and changing your name isn't urgent. Why didn't I sneak my coffee in?

I sat down in an empty chair and pulled out my phone, looking at nothing in particular and draining the short life out of its battery.

I felt a tap on my arm and turned to the man next to me. 

"I don't think they're ever going to call my number," he said. His number was 80-something. "Everyone has gotten out before me."

I assured him he would be before me, then I turned back to my phone.

"Did you know I like feet?" He asks. Um. Where was this going? "It's sort of a...fettish," he continued.

I looked around at the people sitting next to and across from me. Surely they could hear this and would save me!

I uncrossed my legs and tried to hide my new-wife manicured feet. "I like to suck on toes. Your toes look really tasty..."

At this point even my polite self couldn't override my disgustedness and so I didn't reply. He eventually asked why I was there and so the news of my barely-there marriage finally came out. He assured me that if Cal didn't want me, I could look him up and he would take me. Excusemebut you're 30 years my senior. Butthanks. 

He was called before me, and I was about an hour later. But my SS office boyfriend didn't leave without saying goodbye, you know, just in case I was interested. 

First rule of marriage: take my husband with me to foreign places so I don't get yelled at and/or majorly creeped out.