I’ve noticed, as I’ve grown Unmistakably Old, that everything seems to be changing. Yesterday morning was a perfect example. It was my day for banking. Every week I make a deposit, and then cash a small check. Since this is not what anyone would call living on the edge, there was no way I could have predicted a problem.

Walking in the bank’s door, I noticed something was different. The tellers were all young and unfamiliar, and it wasn’t Take Your Child To Work day.

A boy with a shaved head and an eyebrow ring, who was having difficulty with eye contact, waited on me. His nametag said Kevin.

I handed him my deposit, waited for a receipt, then gave him my $20 check, made out to cash—the same procedure I’ve done for the past five years.

Kevin stood, looking at the check with all the intensity of one examining a ransom note, and then looked up at me, focusing somewhere near my left ear. “Do you have any identification?”

“Excuse me?”

“Do you have any identification?” His look shifted to my right ear.

“I noticed you’ve looked carefully at my check.”

He glanced at it again.

“The check has the same number on it as this deposit receipt. The one you just gave me,” I added, in case he hadn’t been paying attention. ”If I were a crook, do you think I would deposit $500 in order to withdraw $20?”

He looked confused, but repeated, “Do you have any identification?”

“Kevin,” I said, hoping that patience and logic could sort this out, “Do you see my check is printed by your bank, and says that I’m a valued customer?”

He squinted, then looked back toward my chin. “I don’t know you, so I need some identification.”

“Yes,” I responded, “we don’t know each other, and perhaps we never will, but since I’ve been here since 1980, a year that occurred before you were born, that means you are the new person. Since I’ve been giving you money, perhaps I should ask you for some identification.”

Kevin turned to call for the manager, who arrived and listened as Kevin explained the problem. Unlike Kevin, she did make eye contact, but her eyes were not friendly.

“It’s a policy designed to protect you.” Her words were measured- perhaps she thought I might be a bit slow. “We need to see some identification before we give your money away.”

I thought I’d try a different approach. “What have you done with the bank’s staff?” I asked. “They’re obviously missing.”

“We are the staff,” she answered in a strained voice. “If you’ll show us some identification, we can give you your money. There are people in line behind you.”

I knew what she wanted was a picture ID, but I wasn’t giving in that easily. Instead, I pulled up my sweater sleeve.

“All right,” I said in my best-resigned voice. “Here is my birthmark. No one else has one exactly like it.”

By now Kevin was trying not to laugh, and I thought I might grow to like him. After all, hair will grow back, and a person can learn eye contact. I was pretty sure, however, that Ms. Manager and I would never become friends.

“A birth mark is not a proper form of identification,” she said.

“Of course it is,” I responded. “The police use it all the time. I’ve seen it on television. Birth marks and dental records are standard ways of identification.” By now Kevin was nodding in an affirming manner.

Ms. Manager sighed. “What about a PIN number? We could identify you that way.”

“Are you trying to trick an old lady?” I asked, my voice rising just slightly. “I think you may have the real bank staff locked up in the vault, and now you want my PIN number! Absolutely not! Maybe you should just give me back my deposit.”

Ms. Manager took one final look at my account on the computer, then said to Kevin, “Give her the $20.”

“Thank you,” I said. “Will you be here from now on so that you’ll be able to identify me?”

She was walking away at that point, but I swear I heard her mutter, “I hope not.”