![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Giving in
I'm on hold with the US State Department, calling to report my lost passport. I'd been trying to stay optimistic, but it's been a week, and I haven't heard back from the airline, and I guess it's now time to give up the ghost.
I'm trying to tell myself that it was destined to happen--I forgot my passport at home on the way to the airport on the first leg of the trip, and it is only luck and the fact that I was two hours early for my flight that got me home and back to pick it up in time to catch the plane. The passport didn't want to be with me, I'm telling myself, it kept trying to slip away last week until it finally did so in a grand and glorious way, left in the seat pocket of my plane seat off to Denver and infinity.
I'm trying to remind myself of the positives--my new passport will have no Israeli stamps, so I can go back to the UAE if I want to! And it would be nice to have a passport where I'm a bit less wide-eyed than in my current passport (although the odds of getting a decent passport photo are quite low, I'm well aware).
But... that passport. There are years of my life in that passport, hallmarks of all the traveling I've done as an adult. That was the tangible reminder I had of Dubai, of Dublin, of London, of Tel Aviv. It was a cheery marker of my ability to go tearing off to another part of the world on a whim. To lose it, to leave it in the seat pocket in front of me like an *idiot* on the way from LaGuardia to Minneapolis, is devastating.
And besides, there are the new logistical complications in my life. That was the only valid state-issued ID I've had since my California ID expired in 2008. Now that it's been reported lost (because I paused halfway through this post when I got off hold) I'm going to need to take a valid photo id with me in the process to get a new one. The DMV is only open on weekdays, 8am-4:30pm, and is really shitty to reach on public transit. The Post Office that serves as the nearest Acceptance Office is also only open on weekdays, 8am-1pm. So basically to fix this I'm going to have to arrange my life around this on two separate days. I'm kind of freaking out a little. I was so calm the whole time I was in Madison, figuring out how the fuck I was even going to get onto a plane to get home without any valid id, still in problem solving mode, but now that I'm actually home and faced with the reality of things...
Shit.
I'm trying to tell myself that it was destined to happen--I forgot my passport at home on the way to the airport on the first leg of the trip, and it is only luck and the fact that I was two hours early for my flight that got me home and back to pick it up in time to catch the plane. The passport didn't want to be with me, I'm telling myself, it kept trying to slip away last week until it finally did so in a grand and glorious way, left in the seat pocket of my plane seat off to Denver and infinity.
I'm trying to remind myself of the positives--my new passport will have no Israeli stamps, so I can go back to the UAE if I want to! And it would be nice to have a passport where I'm a bit less wide-eyed than in my current passport (although the odds of getting a decent passport photo are quite low, I'm well aware).
But... that passport. There are years of my life in that passport, hallmarks of all the traveling I've done as an adult. That was the tangible reminder I had of Dubai, of Dublin, of London, of Tel Aviv. It was a cheery marker of my ability to go tearing off to another part of the world on a whim. To lose it, to leave it in the seat pocket in front of me like an *idiot* on the way from LaGuardia to Minneapolis, is devastating.
And besides, there are the new logistical complications in my life. That was the only valid state-issued ID I've had since my California ID expired in 2008. Now that it's been reported lost (because I paused halfway through this post when I got off hold) I'm going to need to take a valid photo id with me in the process to get a new one. The DMV is only open on weekdays, 8am-4:30pm, and is really shitty to reach on public transit. The Post Office that serves as the nearest Acceptance Office is also only open on weekdays, 8am-1pm. So basically to fix this I'm going to have to arrange my life around this on two separate days. I'm kind of freaking out a little. I was so calm the whole time I was in Madison, figuring out how the fuck I was even going to get onto a plane to get home without any valid id, still in problem solving mode, but now that I'm actually home and faced with the reality of things...
Shit.
no subject
no subject
no subject
I haven't gotten a passport since they started issuing the mini cards with passports, though, and it is possible the mini card will NOT have that stamp, so you could use that as your id and leave the full passport at home!
no subject
no subject
But just to be sure, I will leave all bananas at home.
no subject
no subject
I got there an extra hour early just in case, but then it turned out to be Madison, where there were no lines at all and everyone was WAY nicer than that time I was at LAX and didn't know what I was doing.
no subject
no subject
I am sure it will be okay. And you don't have an imminent international trip hanging over your head (which is more or less the only way I've ever applied for passports). But it is a pain, and I completely understand about the old passport containing your history. I'd be really sad to lose the beautiful visa I got for India or even the multiple stamps attesting to Chinese bureaucracy.
no subject
San Francisco has five million post offices, all of them with different hours. It's just typical that the only one that doubles as a passport authority has the most limited hours.
no subject
But we still see you Sunday, right?
*hug*
no subject
And I'm sorry that you, too, have had important objects running away from you.
no subject