- Faye Dunaway playing Joan Crawford in "Mommie Dearest"
Three months ago, I posted a vague reaction to the fact I'd been served on a civil action lawsuit. The surprise visit to my home from a process server reminded me of a time, long ago, back in the eighties when I was faced with the same kind of action, and I wrote "this ain't my first time at the rodeo."
Yes, back in the eighties I went through my first financial crisis with the cockiness that comes from dumb, young and assumed to be immune to real adversity hubris. But I'm a lot older now, and I've been through many more crises, some of which definitely knocked the proverbial chip off my shoulder for sure.
As predicted in my prior post, the first lawsuit was soon followed by others. I'm up to a total of four now. Three in civil court, one in small claims. The small claims case comes up for tele-conference pre-trial next week.
I've been busy these past few months getting ready for all this and have made the necessary adjustments but I gotta say, I wish I had the nerves of steel as depicted by the portrayal of Miss Joan Crawford in the scene above. I raised my right hand to a judge back in the eighties saying I'd make all effort to payoff my puny debt to the huge company (back then, the company was the 6th largest by revenues in the US) in the agreed upon increments of $50 a month. Today, $50 a month sounds like a small cost but with my part-time earning at only $6 an hour back then, I could only make a couple payments before I defaulted yet again. I never heard from the company or the court about the case thereafter. My assumption was I was just too much of a pain in the ass to chase around for peanuts.
This go 'round ain't peanuts though. Even a 1% monthly payoff arrangement would be in the hundreds and way too much for me to handle. My plan is to drag out the preliminary proceeding (filing dispute to the claims as written answers to the civil charges and not agreeing to the debt or any payment arrangement for the small claims pre-trial) hopefully avoiding summary judgements and presenting as wholly insolvent, thus "judgement proof" to the plaintiffs. Will this stave off further efforts on their part to collect on any judgements they likely would be awarded? Probably not this time. The amounts are too great. But then again, as the saying goes, you can't get blood from a rock. If they do freeze my "assets" they will find pretty barebones bank accounts, a domicile on rented property (untouchable) and a car worth less than $5,000 (maybe untouchable, depends who you ask). No wages to garnish. They can't touch my food stamps (I'm pretty sure), money set aside for health care (maybe) and my retirement IRA. But this won't get them off my back. Not officially anyway. The only way to do that is bankruptcy. And that is in the plans. I think I need to wait until October to initiate that though. I may consult with a lawyer soon to iron this all out but timing is essential.
Suffice it to say, this rodeo's gonna be a lot rougher than the olden days. I'm gonna have to channel the spirit of Miss Crawford to ride the bucking bull 'till the ringing of the bell. Or I'll be flung off and crushed under its hooves. Time will tell.