Slow Banking

I once saw Carl Honoré speak very slowly - for almost an hour - about his book, In Praise of Slowness. I think even he acknowledged that an hour was too long, and it showed. What I took away from his talk is that some things should be slow; others, not so much.

Have you stood in line behind someone who seems to be doing a year's worth of financial transactions at the banking machine? What's up with that? There I was, waiting patiently behind an extremely disorganized woman who tried to juggle cash, bills, at least two banking cards, a plastic bag full of socks, and her purse. What was worse is that she was using one of those machines that are on the streets, right at College and Spadina. I was third in line. A person behind me bailed, deciding to head on over to College and Bathurst and take his chances over there. As usual, I made the wrong decision and waited and waited and waited.

At any supermarket, it is guaranteed that I will select the slowest line. My mere presence is enough to slow down any line. The person in front of me will argue about the price of pig feet or tripe and we end in in price check hell.

When a gust of wind came up, her cash (four or five $20 bills) went drifting down the street. Some good citizens tracked down the flying cash after she said "oh, shit" and ran after them, leaving another stack of cash and some banking cards on a ledge near the machine. She was still "logged in." When she returned, with a growing line behind her, she continued with her slow and disorganized banking.

Cards came out, new cards went in. PIN numbers were entered and re-entered. She stuffed envelopes down its throat. She withdrew cash; she seemed to put cash back in. She dropped her keys. Coins fells to the ground. The wind came up again, but she saved herself. Fifteen minutes later, she finally saw a line that had formed behind her, but this didn't make her go any faster. Fortunately, the dude in front of me gave up, leaving me next in line.

I always feel somewhat exposed when I do any banking on the street, and with good reason. Just a few days ago, police warned people to take extra precautions in Scarborough because people were being robbed at knife point at banking machines. It makes me wonder why we have any machines on the streets.

And now, I am going to slowly write a business plan. In fact, I have been slowly doing that for quite a while now, so maybe I should speed up.