“The check is in the mail.”

I’ve said it. So have countless other financial jugglers. Write the check on a Monday, mail it on a Tuesday and hope it takes at least two days to arrive at its destination so my deposit on payday Thursday covers it. What I’m really saying is, “The race is on. Hope my deposit wins.”

I’m exactly the type of consumer who shudders at the notion of electronic checking and its insidious, inevitable spinoff: instantaneous transactions. Learning to live without a float – the grace time that a check is in transit – will be a challenge, like trying to live without the 30-day grace period that some police officers give you when your car inspection is due.

Boing … boing … boing. I hate the sound of my checks bouncing. I hope my creditors know I’m not exactly proud of my need to float.

I have this vague feeling it shouldn’t be done by a consumer/worker/homeowner past the age of 30.

Do they know that sometimes, in moments of desperation, I have run a magnet over the special type at the bottom of a check hoping to screw up the magnetic field, forcing the electronic reader to spit out my check and buying another day’s grace while the check is processed by hand? Probably.

Are the forces behind the electronic checking movement actually looking out for me? Perhaps they want to reduce my stress by eliminating the deposits-and-checks juggling act in my life.

Or they may be trying to eliminate one more dinosaur in the electronic age – those of us who prefer to take our time making out paper checks in the check-out line at the supermarket.

Either way, this could mark the end of my ritual every other Sunday night, when I settle into my living room couch with my checkbook, a stack of bills, a roll of stamps and a box of Cheez-Its. Within a couple of hours, the bills are paid, statements filed and my junk food craving sated.

And, at least for now, I know the deposits won’t be made for a couple of days.

Hmmm, if the government can make the money move that much faster, what about my metabolism?

– Carol Coultas