Jeana from Laughter for Days to Come has been busy filling out passport applications for her kids. She has to go London in a hurry on a neat work opportunity with her husband, and while they're excited, boy was it a hassle.
I had the same experience when filling out our applications before our recent trip to the Kenyan orphanage that we support.
First came the photos. You are no longer allowed to smile. You must look as much like a terrorist as possible.
But the worst part was the nosy questions they asked. How much do I weigh? Well, that depends. Am I PMS’ing, or not? And do they want to know how much I look like I weigh, or how much I actually weigh, because the two are not necessarily synonymous. I can hide stuff pretty well.
Nevertheless, I filled in my weight, rounded down to account for wishful thinking over the next five years, and then moved on to height. I’m 5’5”. But in Canada we're supposed to think in centimeters, even though none of us do. So now what do I write?
Having to record my daughters’ heights, though, was an exercise in futility. My oldest has grown an inch and a half over the last month. Her height right now will not be her height when the passport office finishes with our applications. I really think you should be allowed to put down ranges on height and weight. At least it would be closer to the truth.
Nothing, however, prepared me for the next line of questions. They wanted to know my hair colour. That is a dangerous thing to ask a woman. This is an Official Government Document, so I have to be accurate, but the truth is I have no idea what my hair colour is. Do they mean natural hair colour? I think I’ve forgotten. If they want me to be precise about my colour right now, some of my highlights are Wella #5RV, and some are Wella Bleach Blonde, but I’ve always wanted to try Wella #5RR, and sometime in the next five years I’m bound to. But all that won’t fit in their little box.
As mystified as I was by these questions, though, I was really thrown through a loop when I came to the “parent” section of the children’s applications. It used to be “Father” and “Mother”. Now it’s “Parent” and “Other Parent”. So I am officially “Other Parent”. Just doesn’t have the same ring to it as “Mommy”, does it?
When I arrived at the box where I had to state my relationship to the child for whom we are applying, I was supposed to write “parent”. But I didn’t. I wrote down “mother”. I may not know my hair colour, and I may be in denial about my weight, but I do know who I am. I’m a mom, and I always will be.
I thought I'd come say "hi" since I saw your comment about speaking to groups on Laura's blog - great tips by the way!
I'm doing my first Skypecast on Thursday so I'll remember your tips (although I've been speaking to various groups for about 18 years).
Love the look of your blog but wanted to ask, "why do you have ALL right-clicking disabled"? I couldn't go clicking on all your links like I wanted because your designer's set it up so you have to click and the new link loads straight away, replacing the current page??
My family lives in Canada - we live in the USA. We decided around Xmas that we better get passports for our 2 kids since we've heard that soon even driving into Canada - even children will need a passport.
The biggest hassle in filling out the forms online was I'd make a mistake...my dh would find it but by then I'd have to redo the whole document b/c it wasn't something I could save. Then I'd redo the mistake and make an error on another one! Eventually we got them all done and took them to the post office to file.
I was shocked to say the least that mailing the passport applications less than a week before Christmas and we rec'd their passports less than a month later!!!!!!! I thought there was always this talk about how looooonnnngggg everyone was having to wait for passports.
About Me: I'm a Christian author of a bunch of books, and a frequent speaker to women's groups and marriage conferences. Best of all, I love homeschooling my daughters, Rebecca and Katie. And I love to knit. Preferably simultaneously.
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Great post, Sheila! And you are cracking me up about the weight LOL.