Cold hard cash

My daughter got her own debit card the other today. I haven’t read the Book of Revelation lately, but I’m pretty sure that’s one of the signs of the apocalypse.

I think my kids believe that debit cards are magic. They don’t fully comprehend the concept yet that without money in the bank account, the debit card is worthless. It’s like the old joke, I can’t be broke, I still have checks!

I was a full-grown adult by the time debit cards came into existence, and replaced cash in my wallet. You can buy just about anything anywhere with a debit card, but every now and then that dependence jumps up to bite me.

For example: I went to a CD store today to buy tickets to go see one of my favorite bands, Blue Rodeo, at Smith’s Olde Bar. I talked to the aging hippie who runs the store on the phone and, when the pot residue allowed him to make a complete sentence, he told me that if I got to the store by 2, I would be able to get my tickets.

So I drove all the way up Alpharetta, which is about halfway to the Yukon Territory from my house, and I went in the store, where Anglo-Cheech tried to sell me the tickets. After staring at the computer screen for a few minutes like the little girl watching TV in Poltergeist, he said, “Ok, there it is. That’ll be $34, dude.”

I pulled out my debit card, and he said, “Oh, it’s cash only for tickets.” Cash? What the heck is going on? Who outside of drug dealers, strippers and Congressmen demands to be paid only in cash?

As luck would have it, I did have some cash in my wallet, so I started counting out the bills, laid everything I had on the counter, and it came to – wait for it - $33. I looked at the guy pleadingly and I said, “I have $33 right here.” And he just stared back at me. He wasn’t having it.

“Hang on a sec,” I said, and I went out to my car, got on my hands and knees, scrounged between the seats and under the floor mats and I was able to come up with a quarter, six dimes and three nickels. I now had $34 on the button, so I went in the store, reminded the guy who I was and why I was there, then paid him and walked out with my tickets.

I got in the car, started heading back south, and it hit me – I had to go through the toll booth on Georgia 400, and that costs 50 cents, and I didn’t have it, cause mister dazed and confused wouldn’t cut me a break on the tickets! I got off at the next exit, found an ATM, withdrew some money, stopped in a convenience store for some gum so I wouldn’t have to break a $20 bill at the toll booth, and got back on the road.

I had always wondered what would happen to you if you got to the toll booth and you just flat-out did not have the 50 cents required to go through. Would they drag you out of your car and beat you? Would they impound your car and make you walk home? Do they take IOUs?

I was about to find out. I pulled up to the one of the booths with a cashier, since I didn’t have exact change, and noticed the brand-spanking-new sports car in front of me, which probably cost about $50,000, wasn’t moving, because the driver didn’t have 50 cents! He was talking to the toll-booth lady, who got out of the booth, walked behind his car, took a photograph of his license plate, went back into her booth, then handed him a slip of paper and lifted the gate. Ok, so THAT is what happens.

The moral of this story is, always keep a little cash on hand. You never know when you’re going to run into a toll booth or a Congressman.