job in a few months, and while I was vainly in love with Sara, I set about to purchase for her a couple of charming gifts for the holidays. I wanted expensive things of enduring quality. With the MasterCard I purchased a gold and diamond tennis bracelet for seventeen hundred dollars, and with the Visa I bought my dearest a set of antique silver earrings. Cost me eleven hundred dollars. The day before she told me she never wanted to see me again, I went to a designer food store and bought a bottle of Dom Pérignon, a half pound of foie gras, some caviar, some fine cheeses and a few other goodies for our Christmas feast. Cost me three hundred dollars, but what the hell, life is short.
The insidious banks which issued the cards had inexplicably raised my lines of available credit just weeks before the holiday season. I was suddenly able to spend at will, and with graduation and work only months away, I knew I would be able to plod along making the small, required monthly payments until summertime. So I spent and spent, with dreams of the good life with Sara.
I hate myself for it now, but I actually put pen to paper and calculated everything. It was workable.
The foie gras rotted when I left it on top of the refrigeratorone night during a nasty bout with cheap beer. For Christmas lunch, I dined alone in my darkened apartment on cheese and champagne. The caviar went untouched. I sat on my unlevel sofa and stared at the jewelry lying on the floor across from me. As I nibbled on large chunks of Brie and sipped the Dom, I looked at the Christmas gifts to my beloved, and wept.
At some unknown point between Christmas and New Year’s, I pulled myself together and made arrangements to return the expensive items to the stores from whence they came. I toyed with the idea of throwing them off a bridge, like Billy Joe, or pulling a similar dramatic stunt. Given my current emotional state, though, I knew I’d better stay away from bridges.
It was the day after New Year’s. I returned to my apartment after a long walk and jog, and realized that I’d been burglarized. The door had been jimmied. The thieves took my old TV and stereo, a jar of quarters on my dresser and, of course, the jewelry I’d purchased for Sara.
I called the cops and filled out the reports. I showed them the credit card receipts. The sergeant just shook his head and told me to contact my insurance company.
I ate over three thousand dollars in plastic purchases. The time has come to settle up.
I’M SCHEDULED to be evicted tomorrow. The Bankruptcy Code has a marvelous provision which grants an automatic stay in all legal proceedings against a debtor. That’s why you see big rich corporations, including my pal Texaco, run into bankruptcy court when they need temporary protection. My landlord can’t touch me tomorrow; can’t even call me on the phone and give me a tongue lashing.
I step off the elevator and take a deep breath. The hallway is packed with lawyers. There are three full-timebankruptcy judges and their courtrooms are on this floor. They schedule dozens of hearings each day, and each hearing involves a group of lawyers; one for the debtor, and several for the creditors. It’s a zoo. I hear dozens of important conferences as I shuffle along, lawyers haggling over unpaid medical bills and how much the pickup truck is worth. I enter the clerk’s office and wait ten minutes while the lawyers in front of me take their time filing their petitions. They know the assistant clerks real well, and there’s a lot of flirting and mindless chitchat. Gee, I’d love to be an important bankruptcy lawyer so the gals here would call me Fred or Sonny.
A professor told us last year that bankruptcy was the growth area of the future, what with uncertain economic times and all, job cutbacks, corporate downsizing, he had it all figured out. This was from a man who’d never billed an hour in private practice.
But it sure looks lucrative today. Bankruptcy petitions are
The insidious banks which issued the cards had inexplicably raised my lines of available credit just weeks before the holiday season. I was suddenly able to spend at will, and with graduation and work only months away, I knew I would be able to plod along making the small, required monthly payments until summertime. So I spent and spent, with dreams of the good life with Sara.
I hate myself for it now, but I actually put pen to paper and calculated everything. It was workable.
The foie gras rotted when I left it on top of the refrigeratorone night during a nasty bout with cheap beer. For Christmas lunch, I dined alone in my darkened apartment on cheese and champagne. The caviar went untouched. I sat on my unlevel sofa and stared at the jewelry lying on the floor across from me. As I nibbled on large chunks of Brie and sipped the Dom, I looked at the Christmas gifts to my beloved, and wept.
At some unknown point between Christmas and New Year’s, I pulled myself together and made arrangements to return the expensive items to the stores from whence they came. I toyed with the idea of throwing them off a bridge, like Billy Joe, or pulling a similar dramatic stunt. Given my current emotional state, though, I knew I’d better stay away from bridges.
It was the day after New Year’s. I returned to my apartment after a long walk and jog, and realized that I’d been burglarized. The door had been jimmied. The thieves took my old TV and stereo, a jar of quarters on my dresser and, of course, the jewelry I’d purchased for Sara.
I called the cops and filled out the reports. I showed them the credit card receipts. The sergeant just shook his head and told me to contact my insurance company.
I ate over three thousand dollars in plastic purchases. The time has come to settle up.
I’M SCHEDULED to be evicted tomorrow. The Bankruptcy Code has a marvelous provision which grants an automatic stay in all legal proceedings against a debtor. That’s why you see big rich corporations, including my pal Texaco, run into bankruptcy court when they need temporary protection. My landlord can’t touch me tomorrow; can’t even call me on the phone and give me a tongue lashing.
I step off the elevator and take a deep breath. The hallway is packed with lawyers. There are three full-timebankruptcy judges and their courtrooms are on this floor. They schedule dozens of hearings each day, and each hearing involves a group of lawyers; one for the debtor, and several for the creditors. It’s a zoo. I hear dozens of important conferences as I shuffle along, lawyers haggling over unpaid medical bills and how much the pickup truck is worth. I enter the clerk’s office and wait ten minutes while the lawyers in front of me take their time filing their petitions. They know the assistant clerks real well, and there’s a lot of flirting and mindless chitchat. Gee, I’d love to be an important bankruptcy lawyer so the gals here would call me Fred or Sonny.
A professor told us last year that bankruptcy was the growth area of the future, what with uncertain economic times and all, job cutbacks, corporate downsizing, he had it all figured out. This was from a man who’d never billed an hour in private practice.
But it sure looks lucrative today. Bankruptcy petitions are
Similar Books
