So Yesterday Bank of America put my family in physical jeopardy (Part two)

UPDATE: Thursday PM: The ONE helpful person at B of A, my local branch's asst. manager, Linda, was quietly making phone calls today. A corporate staffer requested additional info from me. In the meanwhile, my wife has started burning up the phone lines, trying to save her business while she waits out the three weeks she's now been delayed before returning to the US.
Seriously. When you're broke, female, and responsible for a child, Brazil is just like any other Third-world nation: beauty and peace is a thin veneer over a vicious, dangerous underbelly.

Thanks again for all the well wishes. You guys are great.


If you haven't read part one yet, please scroll down to yesterday's post. This is a detailed summary of the events of Tuesday, June 30, When Bank of America caused my wife and son to be stranded in Brazil simply because no one wants to accept responsibility for a simple human error on their part.

PART TWO- Noon to 4PM

By noon, I am getting frantic. I feel completely powerless to do anything. I am cursing the fact that I completely cleaned out our savings to send my family to Brazil. I thought I was doing the right thing. I would normally never eliminate the 'cushion' money that I leave just in case I lose my job or break a leg or anything, that was pretty much how I made a surprise trip to Brazil even possible. That sort of trip is NOT cheap. And now I don't have a way to get my family home.

When I next talk to my wife, I am in my truck, heading to my parents' house. I have to say goodbye to them, as I'll be leaving for anywhere from 2-6 weeks in just a few hours. Done.

When I had spoken to the security specialist at B of A earlier, she told me that I had no recourse. Regardless of how the bank caused all this trouble, they had no interest in making things right. Without options, I go to my local branch bank.
The manager is out on vacation. The assistant manager is sympathetic. This is shocking! Someone is listening to me.
I am not normally blabby. I unload on this woman. I don't get personal, I just give her the details. She gets on the computer, on the phone, and starts looking for ways to help. She runs up against a wall in all cases. Someone on the phone is trying to help her help me, but it's not going anywhere. Along the way, in that chain of command, someone tells them to punt, and thus there is nowhere else to go. I leave, feeling not quite so alone, but nonetheless, still without a solution.

I spend the next two hours on and off the phone with my wife. They've gotten to her mothers' house, and they are safe. They are also 5,000+ miles away from home, and if I can scrape up the money for airfare, I also have to find money for their living expenses. My wife is self-employed here in the US. If she doesn't work, she doesn't get paid. She is going to lose her shirt by not being here, as well.

The reality is, they are safe, and they have food, clothing and shelter. The deadly danger is past. But I am livid, and when I do manage to get my family home, we are going to be living like church mice for a few months thanks to Bank of America.

My wife suggests that I call a Brazilian travel agency in Somerville, one of the outlying sections of Boston, to try to get a better price on tickets, and an earlier flight. I am using my best Portuguese now, which is awful, to be precise, but I get word that there really are no flights with two seats available for the next three weeks. They will call me back with info on the first available flights. They understand the urgency, too. The travel agent actually seems concerned about the safety of my wife and son, and for that I'm grateful.
It is now after 4pm, which is when I had planned to head to Philly for work. I have the nuclear option, which entails leaving at midnght and driving direct to the job, which also means no sleeping for 48 hours.
The travel agent calls me back. If I can get to their office in an hour (doubtful with 15 miles of heavy traffic between me and them), she can reserve tickets for the 21st of July. If I can't get those tickets, it might be a week before she can get another flight with two seats available.

(Really, if you're booked that heavy, why aren't the airlines adding a flight? There are 4 airlines that run between Brazil and the US. There's got to be more folks waiting for a ticket at peak summer travel time).


This is where I need to tell you a few things about my stepson, The Boy, and how hard this is going to make his life for the next year or so.
The boy speaks Portuguese as his primary language. This is because he has a deformity in his throat that makes speaking very difficult, and because my wife's command of english is only a recent acquisition. Before she and I met, my wife had only a very modest command of english. Now, skip ahead. Today, The Boy understands and writes english as well or better than any other 6-year old, but he can't speak it very well.
This past winter, The Boy developed a case of persistant tonsilistis, and the Ear, Nose and Throat doc took one look at his throat, down deep, and dropped a bomb- the speech problem is physical, and is very treatable, requiring two or more surgeries, but with an excellent long-term prognosis. So, while this is sobering news, it is also good news, as The Boy is going to be starting school in September, and if we can get his speech problems on the way to recovery, he can be in a normal class with other kids his age, which is what he wanted. We scheduled the first surgery for a week after my family got back from Brazil. The Boy was supposed to get his tonsils and adenoids removed, tubes placed in his ears, and then have his vocal cords reshaped slightly in preparation for the next surgery, which would take place in early August.

Well, all that's gone. He's in Brazil until no later than the 21st of July.
When my wife told The Boy that they were staying at Grandma's for an extra few weeks, his first response wasn't what you'd expect for a 6 year-old. He didn't think of the beach, playing with his 80+ cousins in town, and all the fun stuff that a 6-year old can do with summer vacation.
He burst into tears, because, he told my wife, that come September, he was going to have to either be in a special class or pretend to be mute, because the kids would make fun of his attempts to speak.

_______________________

I left home at 4pm. The agency closes at 5, and there's the entirety of the world-famous Post Big-Dig Boston traffic between my destination and my home.


(End of Part 2).


Note: Part three is where something amazingly ridiculous happens, when Bank of America puts gasoline on my fire, so to speak. It does not end with my getting tickets for my wife. The bank actively prevented that from happening A SECOND TIME. There is resolution, however, and tickets are acquired, thanks in no way to Bank of America.

So Yesterday Bank of America put my family in physical jeopardy (Part one)

If anyone's curious, there's a condensed version of the following being submitted for publication in print.



And I would like to say the following:

YOU SOULLESS, EVIL COWARDS, HOW COULD YOU?


Part one: 7:30am to noon.



I'm not going to get flowery. I have banked with Bank of America for about 10 years. They're convenient for a well-traveled professional. Lots of branches.


Yesterday my wife and son were supposed to be coming home.

For those of you who are here for the first time, my wife and stepson have been in Brazil for the past three weeks, visiting family. I am an American of Irish Descent, like 50% of all Bostonians. My wife is Brazilian, a startlingly beautiful woman both inside and out. I have been fortunate enough to be married to Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife for a little over a year. We have a boy, my stepson, The Boy, aged six. For our first anniversary present, I sent my wife and The Boy down to Brazil to spend time with my mother-in-law, whom my wife hadn't seen in NINE years.

Yeah, I know, we spent our first anniversary apart. Look, I'm a sailor. This is our life. Can you imagine not seeing your mom for nine years? Yeah. I did a good thing, but I couldn't miss work with the new job and all. I'm just lucky to be working.

Yesterday my wife and son were supposed to be coming home.

At 7: 30am, my phone rings. My wife is freaking out. She reserved a ticket locally on a puddlejumper from the regional airport close to her mom's house, to the major airport where she'd begin her journey home. After 3 weeks of happily using her debit card from Bank of America, the card was being declined. No ticket.

I calm her down, and call Bank of America. No, the person says, there is no problem on our end.

I call my wife. She talks to the clerk at the reservation desk. Card is swiped again a few times. Nothing. It comes up "Not Authorized."

I go online. There's plenty of money- about $600 left in her account. Cheers to my wife for staying within our travel budget! The ticket is only about $150 US for she and our son.

Again, I calm her down, and call Bank of America. No, the person says, there is no problem on our end.

"Well" says I, "There's something wrong here." I call Bank of America a THIRD time. This person says that there was a 'block' placed on her account, and promptly transfers me to the wrong department.

I call back. This is my fourth call now. I get a security person. I explain that time is tight, that there's something going on. The woman explains that the access is being blocked for 'suspicious activity' on the card. Suspicious activity? A plane ticket? The third local flight purchased in as many weeks? No. Sorry. BS. For three weeks and two dozen transactions, there have been no problems. Now, when it matters, my wife is left to hang.


Now, I had called Bank of America a week before my family flew to Brazil. I explained what was happening, and the nice girl on the phone had assured me that there would be no problems.

I'm getting nowhere with the woman on the other end of the phone this time. Can I list some recent transactions? No, I can't. I'm not in Brazil, and my wife is at an airport that has a pay phone, by which I mean, you bribe someone to use their phone. She can't call.
Well, I'm told, she can call collect. No, says I, she can't. Our account is held jointly, and I can verify my identity and my wife's in a hundred ways, but considering that I don't know what the exchange rate is for US Dollars and Brazilian Reals, I can't tell the person how much the last attempted sales were for. My wife thought it would be about $200 US, and that, apparently, wasn't the right answer.

I ask to speak to a manager at the security office, and am rebuffed.
Panicked, I jump online again, and, armed with some old information, I proceed to talk my way past the next security specialists' defenses over the course of 30 minutes of back and forth. I explain that my wife is in a dangerous location, that she is not safe where she is, and I just want to make sure that she is safe. I offer to accept any unauthorized transactions. Finally this belligerent, uncaring, completely inhumane individual is convinced that although I don't have the amount of the latest transaction, the fact that I have every other transaction ever recorded is enough to get the block lifted. Now, the problem here is that my wife's flight has already left. It took me over 2 hours to get the block lifted.
It gets better. This was the only flight that day. The airport is now closed. My wife is hustled out onto the street by the airport staff, who proceed to go home and drink their lunch.

So, imagine that you're in the most dangerous subway station in New York at 2 am. Now make it twice that bad. This is the situation that my wife and son are in.

My wife gets on a payphone on a street, and she is in full hysterics. She is waiting for a policeman to keep her company while she gets in touch with family to come get her. She has to bribe the cop to not sexually harass her.


Imagine being in my shoes at this point. Completely helpless. It was a moment I will never forget. And of my family, I was the lucky one.

My wife is able to get back to her mother's house, thanks to a good Samaritan.

Now we have other problems. I have drained my resources to make this trip possible. TAM, the Brazilian airline, has a strict no-refund, no reschedule policy for missed flights (This makes me appreciate the domestic carriers again. Thanks, guys. You still need more legroom, but thanks).

I can't get my wife home. The next available flight for 2 passengers out of Brazil to the US on any carrier is on July 21st, three weeks from now. The cheapest airfare for July and August is about $3000. It is now noon. In four hours, I have to drive to Philadelphia to catch a boat for work. Options are narrowing. I am about $3000 short of what I need to buy that ticket... and my wife has enough money for food for a while, but that's about it, but either way, she and my son are trapped in Brazil. There is going to be no family reunion for a while.

Part 2 of 3 is next: noon- 4pm.

_______________________

If you're curious, it is now 28 hours since this started. I drove from Boston to Philly during the overnight. I slept 90 minutes drove for 6 hours, and am now on a tug-and-barge unit tied to a dock. My wife is at her mother's house, trying to not lose her business here in the US because she's self-employed and is going to be in Brazil for at least 3 extra weeks, and is hemorrhaging clients. My son had throat surgery scheduled for next week, and I'm trying to reschedule for sometime later this year. The surgeon is booked solid. So my boy is going to miss the first of at least two surgeries necessary for him to speak fully-formed words. Yeah, he's got limited speaking ability, and he was supposed to get the surgery necessary for him to start school in September. Did I mention that? He's pretty pissed off himself. Imagine not being able to tell anyone that you're mad, because only your parents understand what you're saying.

This is the stuff that makes people lose control and do stupid things. Thanks to family and friends, I'm OK, and thanks in no way to Bank of America, my wife is in a safe place while we figure out what to do. Wait until you hear about what Bank of America did to us in the afternoon...

they that go down to the sea...

Johnny Sparks, my old roomate, called with bad news this morning. Big Al, my first sea-daddy, passed away peacefully last night.

I was born into the life of a sailor, and raised with stories of the sea. But I was not exposed to The Life until I was seven years old. My dad was disabled when I was 5, and this left him with a somewhat sedentary lifestyle thereafter. Big Al was the father of a lifelong friend from my Kindergarten class. He was a big, powerful, and rich (to me) old, old man. When I was seven, he was in his late 60's.
Al owned a large business, but his passion was catching lobster. I tagged along. Over the next eight years, we spent at least 15 hours a week together, from April to November, and in the summer, it was an every day, all-day thing. I went from being a smallish child to the gorilla I am today, fed by Al's Italian cooking and a steady diet of heavy lobster pots that had to be slung around.
It's very fair to say that my dad gave me the desire, and Al gave me the know-how. In the end, I followed Al's footsteps and chose a life on deck, rather than in the engine room, and what I know of the sea, of lobsters, of marine biology, that's from Al. From him I learned how to satisfy the burning need to be my own man, to move in rhythm to wave, sun, moon and tide, rather than to sit in traffic and then in a cubicle.
When I drowned, Al was the man who fished me out of the water, hung me upside down and beat the breath back into me. From our days together when I was a confused teen, I cobbled together a plan to keep me on the water for a lifetime.
I miss him already.

when it rains...

I came home only reluctantly last week. I wanted to stay longer and work, because I didn't think that I'd like being in an empty home now that Inappropriate Hot Foreign Wife and The Boy are in Brazil. Turns out, I was right. I've been completely lost without them at home. This amazes me.

I'm not a loner, but I do need a lot more time alone than most people do. So, I've got 2 weeks at my non-home of a home- this place is my wife's. My home is my ancestral turf, located just off the waterfront about 15 miles from here. This home has no memory, no character. It's a rental, so I didn't expect anything as far as homey feelings, and I was not disappointed in that vein.
So I've been drinking. Not crazy amounts at all, just more than I regularly do. If it hadn't been raining for the past 4 weeks, maybe I could get some hiking in, but there's something about climbing a hill in wet underwear. Such things should be avoided where possible. One thing of note regarding my drinking: I went to a new bar, conveniently located right next to my regular Irish bar of a hangout... you have to be from south suburban Boston to understand that there's nothing unusual about a city block with, say, 5 bars all right next to each other, none of which are in competition, or hurting for clientele.
Ever hear about the one about where an Irish family goes on vacation? They go to a different bar.
And so we did. And tending bar is one of the three girls I grew up with.
Like 90% of my friends, I am a product of the Catholic School System. This meant principally that I grew up with the same 15 boys and 3 girls in my class, from age 5 to 14. Social stunting and slight awkwardness ensued for many years, obviously.
But tending bar is Jamie, one of the famous three girls. And she's all grown up. With one or two exceptions, I hadn't seen her since I was 14. The woman in question is of Korean descent, and was always commented upon by my friends' parents as being a beautiful child. In all honesty, as an adult, she is one of the most beautiful women I've ever met.
And she's a sweetheart, turns out. We had a great time going over old times, because, naturally, all of my friends present went to school together.
Imagine that? I'm 35, but about 75% of my good, good friends are people I've known since we were 5. That's a beautiful thing.

One other thing, also a surprise- this girl at the bar still can't compare to my wife, and that's amazing. I'm neither rich nor handsome. I really got lucky.


So today was a rough day. I got some slightly disappointing news at a doc's visit, nothing urgent, nothing bad, just blah, and I luckily saved the day, happiness-wise, by hanging out with a great friend. On the way home from his house, I got rear-ended on the highway. Scared the hell out of me. I've never been in an auto accident before. It could be worse. My pickup, a simple no-frills full-sized Dodge Ram, designed only for hauling bait with low fuel consumption- (i.e, with a slightly beefed-up suspension, but a small engine), got rocked by a VW Passat.

I have a creased bumper. My back bumper got a scratch and a little dent. The passat? Everything forward of the radiator was junk, including the hood.

So here's how I scared the crap out of the already-traumatized girl who hit me:

Imagine that you're a 20-something girl in a nice little VW. You've just butt-banged a pickup in the fast lane of the highway, neatly gliding your car under the rear bumper of the truck in the process. 1.5 seconds later, a very big and definitely redneck-looking wild-eyed man shoots out of the pickup like a watermelon seed between two pinched fingers, and runs for your car.

Apparently I looked bad. The girl started backing up in the seat of the car. She put on an O-face (not the good kind), and proceeded to start to back up and over her own seatback.

I see what's going on. I am heading to the girls' aid, in case she was hurt. I am concerned, not angry. I see the girl trying to shuffle into her own backseat ass-end first. I figure out what's going on, so I slow to a walk, make the 'ok?' gesture,and wait politely about 5 feet from her car.
When the girl sees that I'm not about to eat her up, bones and all, she cranks down the window. I go over the blahblah- 'are you hurt? Did you hit your head? Are you sure you're OK? She calms right down.
A state trooper was right there. He blocked traffic whilst we got into the right-hand lanes. Very nice.
All ended well. I'm getting a new bumper, or at least a new paint-job for my bumper and a dollop of bondo. She's getting a new front end and some body panels.
You know, hours earlier, when I was putting 32 gallons of gas at $2.59 a gallon into the tank, I was wishing for my old commuting car, a very reliable and Most Gay dodge Neon.

Now, I'm happy with my truck again.

short shorts

Things happening now:

1). I discovered Wawa. You should too. They piss excellence.

2). Home Alone: Inappropriate Hot Foreign Wife and The Boy are in Brazil, being tan and beautiful as I type. I am, unfortunately, home. Empty nest, first time. Strange. I used to love being home alone when I was single. Now it's kinda awful.

3). Rain. I haven't experienced 48 rain-free hours in 3 weeks now.

4). Hot Flashes and Mood Swings- I'm reducing my caffeine intake for two weeks to ramp up for the next work cycle.

5). Sweet release. I'm now a trusted employee in my now job, which means no more hot racking

6). Lack of inspiration, and also, lack of sleep, lack of wife, etc., leading to #7,

7) Apathy.

memories

So, the second week of June is now well underway, and it's bringing back memories of when I was a teenager. No, I wasn't holed up in a one-star Philadelphia motel in between cargoes back then, but I was working on the water, and it was 1989, so that makes it 20 years ago this week.
I had a bad summer, and the trouble started before the summer even started. In April of that year, I mangled my right hand, including but not limited to severing my index and middle fingers at the knuckles. This came about because of my budding hobby as a gearhead, and was the seminal incident in which I learned that gas engines are not meant to run on home-brewed Nitromethane, and, in fact, will literally fly apart from the inside out if you rev 'em up high enough.
Anyhow, it worked out. I had my fingers reattached, and spent the next two months in a cast whilst everything healed up. No problems, and I have almost full use of my nosepickers even today.

So that was April. In June, I was ready to return my job as sternman, or crewman, on a lobster boat. The old-timer who taught me how to fish got the OK from my dad to let me go back on his boat and start working again. This worked out well, as I was able to work the kinks out of my stiff right hand for about a week.
Then one day I stepped into a bight (loop) of rope as it was heading off the back of the boat, and I drowned, which was unpleasant. When I was fished out of the water, out cold, the old timer hung me upside down and pounded my back a few times to beat the water out of my lungs, and get me breathing, breaking some ribs in the process... fair trade. I woke right up. My lungs had seized up, anyhow, and only a little water went in. I had simply passed out.

So, I dodged a bullet, had some bad dreams for a little while (5 years), and moved on. I returned back to fishing before too long. Like the old saying "Born to hang, you'll never drown," I figure that someone was watching over me, and regardless of how I check out, I won't delay the day by hiding under my bed.

And so, here I am, 20 years later. In a way, this is far more poignant than any birthday for me. I think that that day was when I grew up. It was definately the day when I went from being a quiet, serious kid with 'so much potential...' blah blah blah, to the borderline-retarded-acting man I am today who wallows in poop and fart jokes when his wife isn't looking.

One other thing happened because of that day. I learned how to hold my breath under water. I had a lot of fun in later years freaking my friends out by popping under water, and swimming full bore to reappear far away 90 seconds later. I don't think that I could do that today, but back when I was 18, I could swim 4 miles nonstop at a strong pace in the ocean. I can still swim for hours, fat as I am. Maybe the cardio part of the exercise is the problem now, but I'm a lot more buoyant too. Although I've only lost about 15 pounds since Jan 1, and don't feel any different, I do get motivated by the memory of how good going for a long swim used to feel a year after.

Oh, one last thing. I'm funny now, as an adult, about people shoving my head under water when I'm swimming, or doing anything that submurges my face when I'm not expecting it. My initial reaction is an irresistable desire to pick them up by the anus and swing 'em over my head like a lasso.

Funny how that happens.

Wicked good accents

Yesterday, as always, some funny talking joker with a Mid-Atlantic non-accent goofed on the way I talk. Now, I'll admit that I've got a very, very heavy Boston accent, but that's not a bad thing, in my eyes. Yesterday, however, I was punchy as hell. Three days running on just a few hours of sleep is what did me in. I calculate that I got 7 hours of sleep in three full days, which is enough to survive, but not, obviously, to thrive. Since my name has not been on the paperwork that accompanies the fuel transfers that I have been assisting with, it's all legal, but still, I was beat.

I'm not sure which was better, yesterday, the 8 hours of sleep, or the 6 hours of movie watching and lying about... either way, I am feeling much better.



Some other things happened. Yesterday was my first anniversary as husband to Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife. Since I am wicked smaht on days when I get to sleep more than 45 minutes, I arranged for us to celebrate before I left for work on Wednesday last, which is also part of the reason why I have been incommunicado with anyone but my family when I was home last week. On that front, it was a crazy, harried vacation, too. My increased pay rate at this new job allowed me to do something very, very wonderful for Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife. I was able to put the money together for her to go visit her family back in Brazil. So, in just a day or so, she'll be seeing her mother for the first time in NINE years.
You can imagine that I'll be dining out on this anniversary present for a while. How the hell do I top that one, though? I have 364 days to figure it out.

She was all smiles, though, which was absolutely worth it.



The flowers are my backup- on the day itself, when I'm not there, a little insurance to remember me by.

















The Boy, who is also travelling with my wife, discovered my half-face respirator, and has since comandeered the same. How the hell he figured out how to screw on the cartriges is another matter. The kid's smart.




















Finally, my being exhausted meant that I missed the opportunity to work on a bunker job that would have seen me tie up alongside my home away from home, the tanker NEW RIVER, where I have spent 8+ months a year for the past five years. My currently assigned barge had the job, but I was lured to bed by the siren call of 8 hours of being left the hell alone. I called the captain and said hi... I'm actually a little homesick for that dusty old ship.