Lease be with you

Today was my first day as a born-again American.

Top of my 'to do' list? Make a bowl cut appointment with the family hairdresser, Lida at HairMasters. That was easy. I'm going on Friday.

Next on the list? Sign up for healthcare. It's proving a trickier task.

In order to apply for 'Special Enrollment' (because Open Enrollment has closed) I need to upload proof of my change of address to the Washington State healthcare website. They'll accept a letter from either a government agency or a utility company.

I tried:

• Updating my voter registration details and requesting a voter registration card, but the address they had on file was already the Kenmore address. 

• Requesting a statement on my student loans, but they only send them via email. 

• Registering an official account at the Social Security website, thinking I may be able to request some sort of official pamphlet. No can do. And ordering a new SS card would cost $$.

• Paying $13 to get an official Driving Record from the Department of Licensing. But what happened after I entered my card details and clicked 'confirm'? That's right, the page re-directed to a PDF of the records to PRINT AT HOME!

Finally, I decided to call WA Health Finder to see if they would accept any alternative documents. Maybe I could just scan in my passport? I could also include my UK visa to show that the expiration date corresponds with my move back to the US?

I spoke to a man called Devoski, who told me that the only other document they would accept is a lease.

D: "Your other option would be to have your Mom create a lease and then have you sign it."

M: "Oh, really? Like, just have her write up a lease?"

D: "Well, not 'write up', but, you know, like get one..."

M: "Oh, so does it have to be notarized or something?"

D: "No, it just needs to be a lease."

M: "OK, so my Mom makes a lease and then I sign it?"

D: "Yes."

—Let me jump in here to say I was pretty skeptical at this point. Have my very own mother type up a lease as proof of my new address? It just seemed so silly. How would that prove that I just moved here? How would they know I hadn't been living here all along?—

M: "Are there any other options? The dropdown menu on the website says, 'mail from government agency', 'mail from utility company' and 'other'. But you're telling me that 'other' really just means 'lease'?

D: "Yeah. A lease is the other option."

M: "So why doesn't it list 'mail from government agency', 'mail from utility company' and 'lease' as the three options? Why do they leave 'other' so open-ended, when the only other acceptable form of proof is a lease?"

D: "I don't know. Those are the only options."

M: "OK, thank you. I'll do the lease then. "

I know that conversation makes me look like a B. But trust me, D was the one being a B. He had a very sarcastic tone.

Snarky customer service aside, I couldn't help but be struck by the absurdity of it all. Let's face it, it would be so easy for someone to forge any one of these documents. Need a utility bill? Just Google the utility company logo, add it to the header of a Word doc and write up some fake billing info. A lease would be even easier. Simply print a free lease template off the Internet and scribble in some random signatures.

I'm not condoning forging official documents. That's fraud. What I'm saying is that the ease at which people could forge official documents discredits the whole system. A lease or a letter doesn't "verify" anything. The only way to prove I live somewhere is to knock on the door at 3am and see if I answer it, half asleep and in my pajamas. Even then, I could have broken in, tied up the actual homeowners and staged the whole thing.

One time Andy needed proof of address at our old flat in Edinburgh, but the utility bills were in our other flatmate's name. Instead, he had me take a snap of him standing on the front step with the door open, one foot inside the flat. We made sure the address letters were visible in the photo. Guess what? They actually accepted it as proof.

Anyway, none of this matters. For some reason, a lease is still valid proof of address. No skin off my back.

Here's my new lease, signed by owner (Nadinski Montbrosis) and tenant (me).

Page 1

I uploaded it. Verification is pending. We'll see if it works.

LYMI,
Margaret

P.S. Being home is great. I've already taken two baths, walked Greenlake, eaten a Weight Watchers fudgical, bought organic cumin seeds from PCC and fed bread crusts to a red-winged blackbird. And it's only my first day back!