In Shaw (an historically gentrified blog)

Lost Cards

If you lose your drivers license on the street, if you haven't moved there is a good chance it might come back to you. Unfortunately Mr. Joshua [insert middle name here] Meyer moved from his Adams Morgan address and I'm going to either toss it in a mailbox or cut it up as I have tried to return it to him.
Early this morning I found his license and credit cards (no wallet) strewn across the bike lane on my way to church. I'm always finding stuff in the bike lane and this is not the first time I've found someone's credit card on the street. I had found another credit card a few weeks before, also on my way to church, and just dumped it off at the Whole Foods. I didn't feel like calling the bank. The bank usually tells me to cut up the card. Or sometimes I go to an ATM and press an obvious wrong number like 1-1-1-1 and the machine eats it.
Since I found this guy's driver's license, I figured the good thing would be to go to said address as it was a few blocks (4 blocks, up a $#!@ hill) off my route. It was one of those apartment buildings where you have to press in a code. Well, seems the code for his apartment did not match who was in it and the speaker was crap. Short story, he no longer lives there. So I head to my original destination. Do that, go to the market, come home and I do a search for the fellow in the phone book. The number listed for him, not the right number. Later I find out, when I call the banks (why am I going through phone trees for total strangers? I dunno, I'm crazy I guess) they tell me he had a different address and they don't have a good phone number to inform him of what's going on. They tell me to either drop the card off at the bank or shred them all.
Why am I doing this? When I was in college I would lose my wallet all the time. It was ridiculus the number of times I misplaced my wallet and had to cancel my cards. Living here I've lost my wallet, a couple of times. There was a woman who did some work to hunt me down and return it to me, so I would like to do the same when I find enough information to work with. One time on election day, I found someone's voter card and insurance card and what have you littering New Jersey Ave, retuned it to their listed address in Mt Vernon Sq after voting. But most times I just find a credit card, a bank card, and usually the name is so common it is not worth it to try to find the person. So I call the bank, they tell me to tear it up. I hate calling the bank. I have to listen to Muzak before getting a human.
Muzak. Really, no good deed goes unpunished.

posted by Mari @ 14.5.06