By Steve Moran
I don’t have any idea if this has anything to do with senior living or leadership or anything.
A few months ago I was working with my 91-year-old stepfather on some banking issues. He lives with us and is experiencing a steady decline in cognitive capabilities. We discovered he had three safe deposit boxes in the San Francisco Bay area, where he used to live before my mom’s passing. The problem was that he had no idea where the keys were or what was in them.
We did know it had been at least 10 years since anyone had opened those boxes.
It took weeks to get ahold of the right people at the branch, schedule a time to have the box drilled, and make sure it fit with my schedule — then an all-day road trip to the Bay area, to watch the boxes being drilled and check out the contents.
The Big Reveal
This was the week of the Kimberly Cheatle Secret Service hearing, so listening to it on the drive down was a great distraction. A side trip to the wrong branch, and finally it was time for the big reveal.
It turns out that the safe deposit boxes in this particular bank were made by an old, old vault company out of San Francisco that no longer exists. So when we walked into the vault, the wall of boxes was full of empty spaces, because once a lock was broken or a box drilled, the box became useless.
Judging by the number of holes in the wall of boxes, we were far from the first to have to do this.
The inside of box 1 looked like this:
So did box 2.
Finally the last box — the big chance for something magical and wonderful to happen. As we had thought about what might be in the boxes, we had realized that maybe they contained my mom’s jewelry — not something of massive value, maybe $10,000 retail, but something, plus some sentimental value.
There were some contents, but they had exactly the same value as what was in the first two. Some old deeds and marriage and divorce papers. Zero value, not worth keeping.
Was It Worth It?
Was it worth it? Ultimately, while the contents were a complete bust and the mystery of Mom’s jewelry remains, it was something that needed to be done. One more thing to not be concerned with, and it did, of course, stop the annual box rental fees.
Hoping I won’t get in trouble with the anti-ageism folks, but the harsh reality is that growing old is more often than not messy business, and as lives move toward that last breath, we are reminded that life has become profoundly complex.
This is where senior living provides so much value. It helps older people and families tackle the inevitable challenges of aging in a way that substantially increases the quality of life for older people. It doesn’t solve the problem of forgotten safe deposit boxes, but it makes dealing with them a little less stressful.
