Woe is Social Security
and other aspects of being
No instances of morbidly funny ableism to report because I haven’t left the house in a day and a half. As lovely as was my accidental COVID-house-hold-induced week with Ian, anxiety levels like mine require time alone to reflect, change course, and dance around ridiculously to BTS’s “Butter.” Oh, also? San Francisco’s weather is being terrible again. The other day, I was sharing the elevator with a young Black dude and we were complaining about the weather. He said, “And I’m from Lousiana so I’m thinkin’—”
I didn’t mean to interrupt but my soul LEAPT and I said “What? I’m from New Orleans, where are you from?”
“Same,” he said.
We stood there for a second and marveled at how weird this was and I said I’d just been home in January for the first time since 2018. Of course he’d been in the midst of making a point, which is that he thought Califronia had good weather as opposed to Lousiana storms, and I rhapsodized unsolicitedly about hot Southern rain and vented that the cold rain here erodes your will to live. We parted ways uneventfully, or at least that’s what he thought: I had tears in my eyes.
Saldy, I am dealing with some on-theme beaurocratic frustrations. A while ago I got a piece of mail from social security informing me that it’s time to update my work history even though I know for a fact they know every damn thing about my entire work history including how much I made when I was a movie theater usher in high school: I recieved a document that actually counted this out.
The document, on paper, assured me that they’ve updated the Social Security system so that I can update this information online. I went to do that, about a month ago, and the website kept glitching, so I called them, but didn’t feel like waiting half an hour for someone to answer the phone, and I had time, back then, to get this in under the 1-month deadline, so I waited.
Then I got COVID and was out of commission for a week and some change.
By the time I was finally able to get on the phone with Social Security it was the day before the one-month deadline, but no big deal, because I can fill out the form online, right?
After waiting on hold for 40 minutes, I find out that this supposed online system has only been updated in a few states. California is not one of them.
So it’s more than likely that I’m going to miss out on my much-needed Social Security check for April. It’s a laugh-to-keep-from-crying situation. I’m going to include a note in the paper envelope explaining that I had COVID and letting them know when. I’ve talked to enough of these people over the years to know that some of them have souls. A few of them decidedly do not. Let’s hope I get a human with a spirit inside.
