Last week I decided to apply for Minor’s Social Security card so that we would have his number in time for tax season. This promised to be a nervewracking process, because the intersection of “adoption” and “federal government” is always a potential trainwreck. Each federal employee has his own special understanding of which documents are required to formalize an international adoptee’s status in this country, and I have never met a clerk who is familiar with the newish law that says that adopted children are automatically U.S. citizens as soon as their adoptions are final in the U.S. I am always being asked for the kids’ “proof of citizenship” or “naturalization papers,” which don’t exist.

So I drove twenty miles to the nearest Social Security office. The waiting room was tiny, and almost empty, but a security guard directed me to take a number. I took a number and sat down and realized that I had left Minor’s birth certificate, a required document, on the kitchen table.

I drove twenty miles back to Port City, which is not easy when you are banging your head back to the steering wheel, and got the birth certificate.

Twenty miles later (sixty total, if you’re keeping track at home) I was back in the now-empty waiting room. I took a number. The clerk took my application and we began negotiations about what does or does not constitute “proof of citizenship.” With that hurdle cleared, he asked for my social security number, and then entered it into the computer.

“This is the wrong number,” he said.

I recited it again.

“This is not your number,” he said.

I had the number written in at least ten places in my paperwork the exact same way. I asked him to check again. “Maybe you have it under my maiden name?”

“No, this number belongs to a man who was born in 1934,” he said. “Do you have your Social Security card?”

I didn’t, simply because no one ever asks you to produce your card, and I’ve had the number memorized for years. I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. I was certain that it was the correct number. How was I going to prove to the federal government that I existed? It was like that scene in so many thrillers where the hero tries to use a credit card or ID and finds out that the government has erased his identity. Was I going to have to go on the lam?

I pretended to search for my card to stall for time, all the while wondering what the HELL was going on. “Can’t you search for me by name?” I asked.

He did, and said, “Oh, there you are.”

“What do you mean, ‘there you are’?”

“I’ve got it here. And there’s your number. The other record was just showing me something different. Don’t worry about it.”

The Social Security database shows some strange man’s information attached to my number. Memo to the federal government: I AM OFFICIALLY WORRIED ABOUT IT.

I found myself wondering whether there is a special dispensation for someone who does bodily harm to a Social Security clerk in such a situation. Surely our justice system would be lenient in such a case — it would be viewed as the legal equivalent of a venial sin.

Luckily, though, before I could decide on a course of action, I saw the large placard in the window advising me that, pursuant to 28 CFR Part 64.2, it is a federal crime to kill, kidnap, assault, threaten, intimidate, or interfere with a federal officer in the course of his or her duties.

Hmmm. What if I just stuck my tongue out at him and said, “Nah nah nah nah, you were wrong”?

Let me just consult my handy-dandy Electronic Code of Federal Regulations.

Nope, nope, it says it is also a crime to “retaliate” against said officers.

Nothing about blogging, though.