A Brief History of Things I Put Somewhere Safe

They remain extremely secure, even from me.

This morning, Wix asked me to complete a CAPTCHA to prove that I was human. This seemed reasonable. I have been human for quite some time and felt reasonably qualified.

Unfortunately, the CAPTCHA did not agree.

I clicked on the squares containing traffic lights. Then bicycles. Then crosswalks. Occasionally, a small section of an object appeared in the corner of a square, requiring me to decide whether three inches of bicycle tire legally constitutes a bicycle.

Apparently, I made some errors.

The CAPTCHA refreshed and presented me with another test. And then another. Before long, I was trapped in a loop, repeatedly attempting to establish my membership in the human race.

Eventually, Wix locked my account.

I opened Wix Support, assuming there would be a topic titled “CAPTCHA Failure,” “Locked Out of Account,” or perhaps “Website Owner Mistaken for Machine.”

There was not.

I could, however, chat with a support bot about my problem.

All I had to do was log into my Wix account.

This was an exciting development, since being unable to log into my Wix account was the reason I needed support.

Wix then suggested that I try a different browser or open an incognito window.

Apparently, I needed to hide from the World Wide Web.

I changed browsers. I went incognito. Concealed from the internet, I attempted once again to gain entry to my own website account.

Wix remained firm.

Either I was not human, or I was a sophisticated criminal attempting to hack into a psychotherapy and wellness website. I was no longer certain which accusation was being made, and Wix did not seem interested in discussing the matter.

To regain access, I was required to upload a photograph of my driver’s license and then take a photograph of my face so Wix could verify that I was truly me.

I understand the need for security. Still, I found myself wondering whether employees at NASA have to provide this much identification before updating a page about the Mars rover.

I do not work for NASA. I was trying to make a change to my website.

I finally got into my account by opening Wix on my phone.

I hate using Wix on my phone. I need my eyeglasses to see it, my fingers are apparently too large for several of its functions, and the phone version does not do everything the browser version does. Nevertheless, Wix welcomed my phone as though it were an old and trusted colleague.

I fear I am beginning to sound like my mother when she encountered an automated telephone system and could not decide which number to press.

I understand her predicament now.

Press 1 for billing. Press 2 for technical support. Press 3 if your issue is not listed. Press 0 in the possibly delusional hope that a human being still works there.

Sometimes none of the choices quite applies. I sit listening to the options, trying to determine which incorrect answer is most likely to move the process forward.

If I do eventually reach a person, I wonder whether that person has to complete a CAPTCHA before being permitted to answer the phone.

Perhaps customer-service representatives begin every shift identifying traffic lights. Maybe somewhere, right now, a support specialist is trapped in a loop, unable to prove that she is human enough to speak with me.

This was not the first time I had difficulty proving that I was me.

When I recently applied for TSA PreCheck at Office Depot, they had trouble getting my fingerprints. They no longer use ink. There is now a digital fingerprint machine, presumably designed to make the process faster and more accurate.

My fingers declined to participate.

The employee tried several times before informing me that my fingerprints were unusually faint.

I had encountered this problem before when I began working at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. Because I would be working with children, I had to be fingerprinted as part of a background check to establish that I was not a criminal, more specifically, a pedophile.

At the time, they still used ink. They rolled my fingers across the card repeatedly, but my fingerprints remained stubbornly noncommittal.

Eventually, I had to sign an affidavit stating that I was who I said I was and that I was not a criminal.

Apparently, when biometric evidence fails, we return to the honor system.

One of the hospital security police who did fingerprinting told me that my faint fingerprints would make me an excellent cat burglar. This was reassuring. If psychotherapy and writing do not work out, I have a backup plan.

I already work well at night, own dark clothing, and live with two cats who could provide technical consultation.

My relationship with security has always been complicated. I want my information to be protected. I would also like occasional access to it.

This brings us to my seven pages of passwords.

Seven.

These pages contain access to nearly every functioning part of my life: banking, medical portals, insurance, email, social media, business accounts, utilities, and websites that insist I created an account in 2014.

The document resembles a minor congressional report. Some passwords have been crossed out and replaced so many times that the pages have become an archaeological record of my online identity.

One account requires a capital letter, a lowercase letter, a number, a symbol, and perhaps evidence of moral character. Another does not allow the symbol I used for the first account. A third remembers my password but does not remember that it remembers it.

Then there are the accounts that require me to create a new password because I have used the old one before.

Yes. That is how I remembered it.

If I admit that I have forgotten my current password, the account sometimes asks whether I remember any of my previous passwords.

This seems optimistic.

If I cannot remember the password I created six months ago, why would I remember the one I used three years ago? I can barely remember what I had for lunch yesterday.

Apparently, forgetting my current password is not the problem. The problem is that I have failed to maintain a comprehensive historical archive of passwords I was specifically instructed never to use again.

The website already knows my previous passwords. It remembers all of them. It simply wants to know whether I do.

Another CAPTCHA, apparently—this time to determine whether I have access to my own past.

The safest arrangement would be to keep the password list on my body at all times. Possibly laminated and attached to me. This would work beautifully unless I were mugged, in which case the person would not merely get my purse. They would receive a complete administrative transfer of my identity.

I could use an online password manager. People recommend these to me in the calm, reassuring tone generally reserved for explaining that there is a very simple solution to a problem I have unnecessarily complicated.

A password manager stores all your passwords securely. To access it, you need only remember one master password.

I would then need to write down the master password and put it somewhere safe.

Passwords, of course, are now considered insufficiently secure, which has led to the Authenticator app.

The Authenticator provides a six-digit code that expires in approximately twenty seconds. This creates the atmosphere of a low-budget action film.

I locate the correct account, memorize the number, return to the website, and begin typing. If I fail to complete the mission before the countdown ends, the code disappears and is replaced by another one.

I then have to delete the now-invalid number and quickly enter the new number before it also expires.

Somewhere, I assume, a small digital device begins beeping as the seconds count down.

I am a psychotherapist and writer. I was not trained for this.

Passkeys were introduced to make the process easier. With a passkey, I no longer need to remember a password.

I only need to remember where the passkey is.

Is it stored with Microsoft? Is it an Apple passkey? Is it on my computer? My phone? In the cloud? Which cloud? Why does Microsoft appear to know who I am on one device but regard me as a stranger on another?

I have attempted to create passkeys several times. I believe I now have some. Where they are and what they unlock remain confidential.

Possibly even from Microsoft and Apple.

We also own a small safe where we keep valuables, important papers, and things I need to remember. This is reassuring in theory. In practice, every time I need something from the safe, I have to ask my husband for the code.

I could add the safe code to my password list, but I would first need the password list to retrieve the code that opens the safe where I placed the master password that gives me access to the password manager containing all my passwords.

This is what experts refer to as enhanced security.

At some point, a system becomes so secure that it successfully prevents all access, including by the person who owns it. Wix and I apparently arrived at this conclusion independently.

The safe is only one part of a larger organizational system I have developed over the years. When something is important, I put it in a safe place.

Unfortunately, “somewhere safe” is not a geographical location. It is more of a spiritual realm.

I have put tax documents somewhere safe.

Keys.

Medical paperwork.

Gift cards.

Receipts for expensive items.

Instructions for appliances that malfunction immediately after the instructions disappear.

I never put these things somewhere ridiculous. That would make them easier to find. I put them somewhere sensible—so sensible that, when I eventually discover them six months later, I think, “Of course. That was an excellent idea.”

Sometimes I move an item from its usual place to an even safer place.

“I’ll put this here,” I tell myself. “I’ll definitely remember.”

This statement has never been supported by evidence.

The phrase “I’ll definitely remember” should be legally recognized as a declaration of abandonment. Once spoken, the item is no longer part of the household inventory.

It has entered protective custody.

Medical paperwork is especially skilled at this. It can sit untouched on the kitchen counter for three weeks, becoming part of the landscape. I move it to a safe place so that nothing happens to it before my appointment.

On the morning of the appointment, it is gone.

I search the desk, the filing cabinet, the stack of papers on the counter, and several drawers that have never contained medical paperwork. Eventually, I check the side of the refrigerator where I have begun hanging sheets of important papers with magnets, because at some point all investigations lose professional standards.

To be clear, any medical paperwork wandering around my house belongs to me. Client information is securely maintained through locked storage and HIPAA-compliant systems. The wheels have fallen off only my private life. Professionally, all wheels remain attached and HIPAA compliant.

Keys operate differently. Keys disappear briefly but dramatically, generally when I am already late.

On Sundays, when I go to art class, I carry my supplies in a separate art bag. Rather than bring a purse as well, I put my phone, driver’s license, house keys, and car key in the art bag.

This makes perfect sense.

One morning in the middle of an icy, bitterly cold winter, I grabbed my purse and work bag and left for the office. I did not take the art bag because I was not going to art class.

When I reached my car, it did not unlock automatically.

The car key was in the art bag.

I turned around to go back into the house and retrieve it. That was when I remembered that my house keys were also in the art bag.

I was now locked out of my car and my house. My keys were safely inside, exactly where I had put them.

Shit.

I called my husband, who was at work fifteen miles away. He agreed to drive home and rescue me, but it would take about half an hour.

It was below freezing. The street was icy and covered with snow. I began walking around the neighborhood to stay warm, concerned that if I stood still for too long, my toes might fall off.

Then I remembered there was a funeral home down the street.

Fortunately, there was a viewing in progress.

Not so fortunate for the deceased.

I went inside and stood in the vestibule, attempting to look like someone who had a legitimate reason to be there. People came and went, glancing at me curiously.

I considered going into the viewing room, offering the deceased a respectful prayer and send-off, and thereby becoming an actual participant rather than a woman using the funeral home as an emergency warming center.

In the end, I remained in the vestibule until my husband arrived and collected me.

I am not sure what he told his coworkers when he left work. “I need to pick up my wife at the funeral home” raises questions that cannot be efficiently answered.

My keys, meanwhile, remained secure in the locked house.

Tax documents take a longer view. They disappear sometime in February and reemerge in late April, after additional copies have been requested and several people have been inconvenienced.

The most frustrating part is knowing the missing object is not actually lost. It is nearby, resting peacefully in a location selected specifically for its protection.

Nothing will happen to it there.

Nothing will happen with it, either, but that is apparently outside the scope of the security program.

Someday, someone will open a drawer, a decorative box, or a folder labeled “Important” and discover the complete administrative history of my life. They will find old insurance cards, expired coupons, unidentified keys, medical forms from 2017, and several versions of a password that may once have provided access to something.

Everything will be in excellent condition.

The system has worked.

Between the seven-page password list, the password manager, the master password, the Authenticator, the passkeys, the safe, the safe code, and my unreliable fingerprints, I have assembled a security system with no obvious point of entry.

This may explain why Wix mistook me for an intruder.

Technically, I was trying to break into my own life.

It turns out that my information, documents, valuables, passwords, keys, website, and identity are completely secure, even from me.

I am being kept from my own life, but at least no one else is getting in either.

---

Janet Nash, MSW, LISW-S, Yoga Therapist, CCTP, is a psychotherapist, writer, and founder of Interiority Wellness. Her work explores mental health, generational healing, creativity, nature, and the quiet ways we find our way back to ourselves.