What’s in your wallet, Peter Keating?
Tess Vigeland: What if I walked up to you and said, “Show me your wallet! We wanna see what’s in it and why!” That’s what we’re doing every week in random places across the country. And in fact this week — we left the country.
Peter Keating: My name is Peter Keating, I’m just outside the Cafe de la Villa in Montreal, Canada. It’s a brown leather wallet; I think it says “Genuine Calf.” I never keep money in my wallet; I always keep money in my pants’ pocket. I have some bills that I’m saving. Ah, I have Gayle Simone, she’s my notary. Eddie Bauer, I have an Eddie Bauer card. The problem with this is there’s no Eddie Bauer in Montreal, so I don’t know why I have this. And I have my license with my picture on it, and I’m getting old.
It’s one of those billfolds, standard size, with a couple of slots of my many many credit cards — well, my one credit card. I found it on the street. True, I did find it on the street and then I just patched it up here with some masking tape to hold it together. And it’s a perfectly good wallet. And oddly enough, it’s the wallet I’ve had for the longest time.
That’s one side of the wallet, then it just gets better and better. This is my health care card, this gives me health. Nobody pays for health in Canada. Well, that’s not true, we pay taxes in Canada that pays for our health. And I have private insurance, which I’ve never actually used, and I don’t know what it’s for. Remember to figure out what you can do with it.
The oldest thing is a picture of a friend’s daughter, who’s now… This is getting a little greasy here, and it’s a lovely picture as you can see — she’s there with her older sister. That’s been there… Oh hold on, gosh, somebody’s phone number. There’s my banking password! I’ve been looking for that for years! I’m not kidding, it’s unbelievable! It was hidden behind the picture.
Vigeland: Thanks to Judith Ritter for getting that wallet opened for us. And you can do more wallet-peeping at Marketplace Money. And tell us your wallet stories on our Facebook page.
Stories You Might Like
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.
