I have been violated

Yesterday, the kids and I met a friend at a local pool and enjoyed some fun in the sun. My kids were having chlorine withdrawals and desperately needed a pool fix and I was all too happy to oblige. After about an hour and a half of swimming, I had a sense that I needed to go check on my stuff. As I walked up to my bag, my stomach sank at the sight of my towels all askew. After frantically searching through the bag, I realized my wallet had been stolen. Not cool.

So, I wrapped a towel around myself and reported the theft to the front desk, who kindly called the police for me so I could file a report. The cops were very helpful, searching the whole park and looking in all the trash cans to see if maybe someone had just taken the cash (a whole 8 bucks – woohoo!) and tossed the wallet – no such luck. As I was describing to the cops the contents of my wallet, I realized that I had mine and all three kids’ social security cards in it. Great – now I get to worry about identity theft! By the time they left, the pool was closing, I was annoyed and the kids were starving and water logged. So far I’ve already cancelled both credit cards, put a hold on the blockbuster account and called Transunion to get info on fraud protection (which is going to be a huge hassle, blah). Tomorrow, I get the grand opportunity of spending what I’m sure will be ridiculous amounts of time on the phone with the FTC to figure out how I protect my kids’ identities, as well as calling several other places to give them a head’s up. I will also have to try to get a new license with three kids in tow – good times.

While for the most part, I’m sure we are fairly safe from any kind of major theft or fraud, it’s been annoying to have to deal with this headache. Whoever took the wallet won’t get our money and likely won’t get our identities (though who knows nowadys), but they have stolen a good deal of my time, and a little sanity as well since the spawn of satan himself seems to descend upon my kids every time I get on the phone. But, besides those minor hassles, it’s been nice to feel relatively unphased by this turn of events. Especially when you read something like this. Reading how people are truly, deeply suffering puts my missing wallet into perspective. Will the next couple of days be difficult as I deal with all of this? Yes. In the grand scheme of life does that matter? No. I don’t care about that wallet. The things I care most about are surrounding me and nothing else really matters when placed up next to them. I am grateful for the things that we have – the blessings that surround us. The rest is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. Now if someone could just remind me of that around 11:00 tomorrow as I sit here with the phone pressed to my ear and the kids screaming in the background…