When I got back home after a year in Portland I owed a bank three hundred dollars in loans.
The story starts in the University Credit Union (UCU) loan department. A cubical with carpet wall dividers, with the frosted wavy glass at the top. The female banker sat behind a desk, one part for paperwork, the other part to the side for the computer. 'You do not have any credit we can not give you a loan without a co-signer.' I thought to myself Well there goes any hope of eating this summer.
I was not about to go back home, I enjoyed living on my own and being in the city. So I stayed, the payment plan was not all that bad, one fourth the summer fee each month. The problem lied in me wanting to pay it off in two so that I would have a bit in savings when school started up again. I payed in all but twenty dollars, the day I got my check. Two days later I was out of food and still had five days until my next paycheck. The first three days I spent eating the teddy grams from my mother care package, and drinking the 36 pack of mountain dew that I walked a mile with, after it was given to me at a LAN(Local Area Network) party. On the third day I woke up three times chugging a can of mountain dew, only to just pass out again.
I decided to use my UCU debit card to take out money, to buy a sandwich, I figured I would just have to pay a fee. The next few weeks found me with a good amount of money, and I went to the bank to make sure that I did not owe them any money, I did not. I continued to spend my money on CDs, energy drinks, and food.
As it turns out the UCU debit card comes with an over draft protection. When a card holder overdrafts the 'small' sum of one hundred dollars is transferred into their account. This protection covers up to three hundred dollars in loans.
To set myself straight money wise I decided it best to move back home.
Just to recap, in order to obtain a loan from the University Credit Union: You must prove that you have no idea what you are doing with your account. Don't bother trying to apply for a loan, just get a debit card with overdraft protection.
-NK
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2 comments:
Sure sounds like it ought to be a narrative: young man in the big city fighting a faceless institution in order to keep from starving. Classic.
But somehow all the intrinsic drama is drained out. Instead of concentrating on the dramatic elements you ride the second horse, the bank loan--you did this before in another narrative, didn't you? Create two parallel topics but, instead of creating synergy, creating a parasite topic that drains the juice from the one without really enabling the second?
You're quite right in your title--those are the two core elements in the story. The loan, the money? We lose you almost immediately in the start of the third graf, where you're describing plans and fees and checks we don't understand at all.
Could it be that in your analytical and philosophical temperament, story-telling simply does not strike a chord?
I think that the problem comes with condensing the information. Picking and choosing what is important enough to make it into the work. Between taking money to buy the sandwich and finding out that I owed money was a two month time span.
If I was telling a friend this story it would go,
That reminds me of the time I lived on teddy grams and mountain dew.... It got so bad that I woke up three times in one night chugging an mountain dew and passing out... I think that it was the only thing keeping me alive... when I ran out of mountain dew I overdrew from my account to buy a sandwich...(normally there is a good solid amount of laughing and clarification)
To make it a story that had some meaning I tossed in the debit card. To make the ridiculous banking look as ridiculous as it was I gave the first and last parts of it.
I think I may just be writing portions of a larger story, with the ends summed up to make it function on its own.
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