A Passport for Payton
I’m Payton - I’m 15. My friends call me BabyBeeZy but you can call me P-BeeZy. My mom is kinda old but not, like real, real old and this is her blog. She’s pretty cool but sometimes she’s totally weird. Like this morning. It’s Saturday so I’m sleeping in while she’s running “errands” around town. She always does this on Saturdays. Sometimes she just goes and goes like the Energizer Bunny. So anyway, she calls and says for me to get ready cause I need to go for my passport. She’s gung-ho for me to go to Japan with her this year. To be honest, I’m kind of excited but don’t tell her I said so.
So back to the passport …
We went to a photo shop called “Snappy Photo”. We were running a little behind, getting to the store around 1:45 knowing the store closes at 2:00. My “parental unit” was a little hyper as we walked in. She gets that way sometimes when she’s got a lot going on or if she’s stressed. I guess she figured it’d be too late to get the pics done but the guy behind the counter was like “no problem, come on back”.
“Back” was a little room off to the side of the main counters. I had to stand in front of a white pull-down shade and the photo guy told me not smile or anything. It’s a new rule for passport pics he said. So, I didn’t. Smile — I didn’t smile. He snapped the little remote control thing-y and a flash went off in my face. Wasn’t really expecting that but it wasn’t so bad. He told me to meet him back at the register and 5 minutes later I had my passport photos. They cost $9.95 for two and of course, my mom paid.
From the photo shop we went to the library to turn in the passport application. Since I’m only 15 my moms had already filled out everything online and printed it out. Something called a DS-11. I guess that’s the form number of the passport application thing-a-ma-bob. She’s always explaining things to me but I only listen, like, 1/2 the time.
While we were waiting to be waited on, one of the librarians from my old elementary school called out to me. I was surprised to see her since she was my favorite librarian at my favorite school and I hadn’t seen her in a few years. Those were the good old days. We talked for a minute but she wasn’t the one who was going to make me sign my passport stuff. Some other librarian did that. I didn’t know her, but she was nice.
She asked for my I.D. but I was like “dude, I’m only 15″ and she was like “wow, you’re so tall and grown-up looking for 15″. My mom gave her my birth certificate instead and then showed her own I.D. — her driver’s license. I got a peek at my birth certificate and noticed my dad isn’t listed on there. I was like “mom, what up with ‘dat” and she just gave me “the look”. You know the one — it says zip your lips before I punch you in the eye. Turns out my parents weren’t married when they had me (snicker) so she had to prove that she’s in charge of me or whatever. Otherwise, both my mom and my dad would have had to be there for me to get my passport.
After the librarian lady looked over everything, she read me an oath. I can’t really remember what it said but something about not lying about what we wrote on the application and swearing the guy in the pics was really me. I had to hold up my left hand while she read it. Made me sorta feel like an idiot but I did it cause I didn’t want my moms to smack me. After she read it I was like “yeah, oaky” but she said I had to say “I do” instead. Like I was getting married or something! Adults are so complicated!!
And that was all there was to it. Except mommy-dearest didn’t realize she didn’t have any checks in her checkbook to pay for the passport. She ended up having to run out to a gas station up the street and get some money orders. One for $60.00 which was the cost of the passport, and one for $25.00 which was the processing fee. Luckily the librabrian lady was real nice and said she’d wait for mom to get back. Once she did, we put the application, the $60.00 money order, my birth certificate and pictures, and a copy of my mom’s license into an envelope to be sent off to some government agency.
And that’s it. I guess I should have the passport in the mail within 4-6 weeks. I hear the government can be kind of slow so I hope it gets here in time. Maybe I should try to send a note to President Obama and ask him to keep an eye out for it since he’s always answering people’s e-mails and stuff. But he’s probably got more important stuff to do so I guess I’ll just wait.
