The Painful End of Things

i saw this search query that lead to the accidental finding of my blog. it was four words strung together and went as follows:

"bank of america dildo"

at first glance, i brushed it aside as one of the many dildo-related searches that somehow funnelled down to my meaningless writings. giraffe dildos and such. it's all the same and it's all accidental.

then, shortly after, i received a letter in the mail from none other than my bank: bank of america. they painted the letter to appear as though it were a follow up to my many recent complaints regarding their methods of stealing my money.

"After several attempts to reach you by phone, we have resolved the issue." it began. to me, that is where it began and ended. the rest was standardized and said things like "we want to thank you" and "loyal customer" and other corporate verbiage that may have been written by a computer somewhere off in the far lands of banking and thieving.

of their "several attempts" to reach me, my phone says nothing. my phone says the only form of contact bank of america and i ever had was the time i called them asking why they had not called me. and during that call, i was politely and swiftly informed i would never be receiving the money they rightfully stole from me because-- after all-- they stole it rightfully.

there were no explanations or understandings or anything of the sort. just one hundred and five of my american dollars taken silently out of my account never to be returned. why? because we can and because we will and because we know you can't do a whole lot more than call to complain and perhaps write about it on your blog.

i went through two bank visits, two phone calls, and a whole lot of useless waiting. and out of it all, i regained just thirty-five dollars.

i held that letter in my hand feeling like a mighty fool. or perhaps a mighty tool. i'm not sure which 'ool it was and in hindsight i'm not sure i even felt mighty at all. what i do know is i had been man-handled by a bank and there was a large stack of nothing i could do about it.

what took me six hours to earn took them one minute to take.

and now, through letter, they kindly informed me that they were so completely alright with taking my earnings that they would only go as far as pretending they'd tried to follow up and would move forward by calling the thievery of my pay "resolved."

at the moment in which i realized i had been beaten, that perhaps the day when intelligent complaints were absorbed with listening ears had long since died in a flurry if lazy digital "fuck you"s and gentlemen in ties, i sat down and looked back at my computer screen.

"bank of america dildo," it said to me.

and it all made sense in a brilliant way.

the bank of america dildo: for those of you who don't have a checking account but still want to be fucked in the ass by the bank.