I took this photo in March 2013 when we went up to Sault Ste. Siberia to empty out The Commander’s safe deposit box. We had to do that because PNC Bank was about to close the Sault branch.

Although I don’t get melodramatic about things like this, that experience evoked a bit of nostalgia for me. I “grew up” in that bank building, going into the vault and behind the tellers’ windows and playing with the adding musheen dad often brought home.

It was the 1st National Bank when I was a kid and my grandfather and dad worked there. They both began in the lowliest of positions, grandad as some sort of “messenger” (if I’m remembering correctly), dad as an Assistant Teller. They both ended their careers as president of the bank. Banking biz or not, my family was not wealthy, although I had enough tools up my sleeve to play “rich girl” when I went “downstate” to college but that would be a whole ‘nother story and I haven’t felt the need to play that game for one helluva long time, thank you Zeus!

My dad oversaw a couple of major transitions for the bank. One to computerization. That was NOT fun for him and I often wonder what he would think about his tech savvy daughter’s career in the online banking biz. The other transition saw our little local bank become part of a holding company. Eventually there were three of those acquisitions, ending with PNC, but he was only involved in the first one.

As an odd coincidence, the bank manager at the time I had to empty the safe deposit had been The Comm’s next door neighbor. She told me there were photos of my dad and grandfather in the basement. Did I want them? They would have to throw them out otherwise. Well, yes, of *course* I did. And (of course) after an initial flurry of excitement, they are still languishing in the Landfill Dungeon (on The Comm’s teak gate leg table, anyone want it? 🐸) with all the other family photos that I don’t (yet) have the time or psychological energy to organize.

Anyway, there is so much snow in Sault Ste. Siberia *this* year that a lot of the parking meters are totally buried and the city has declared free parking until the snow recedes enough that the meters emerge again. Which doesn’t sound like it’ll be soon because there are winter storm/blizzard warnings for the next couple of days.

Here on The Planet Ann Arbor we are not expecting a whole lot of snow but we are expecting high winds. We’ll see what happens. We have a generator so if we lose power we’ll be okay. But. I do hope trees don’t start falling down.

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