WICKED WEDNESDAY
Welcome back, Anne Hamilton Fowler. Such a fun guest and a fun post. Enjoy!
The following wicked adventure is just one of the many in the life of MAL (short for Margaret Anne Louise), the name often utilized by friends when referring to any of my nefarious deeds!
Since the venture required recruiting skills, it looked like one made to order for MAL. Owner of a well known personnel agency, she was a seasoned recruiter with over 25 years of experience. A meeting was attended where details of the game were skillfully laid out by the current top of that particular pyramid. The fact that it was an endeavor severely frowned upon by the Toronto constabulary didn’t deter those of us who had visions of grandeur and dreamed of a $17,600 reward. After all, it’s not like we’re robbing a bank we told ourselves. And, we are recruiting adults who know what they’re getting into, don’t they? Certainly, my recruits were under no illusions and I had made very clear the possibility that they could lose their money. This rationale was how I justified my actions and participation in the scam. Unfortunately, many investors across the city did lose their money when they were unable to produce the required number of recruits. Was MAL one of those people? Surely you are joking! She made the operation a fulltime career bringing her friends, clients and colleagues on board. Most of them achieved one payout and stopped. But MAL was obsessed with the whole hype surrounding celebratory parties, expensive lunches and thrilled by the challenges involved. The buckets of money didn’t hurt either. Using the mantra of Winston Churchill…she KBO!
The venture became such an obsession that for several months most of her workday was devoted to planning, prospecting and strategizing.
Expanding the scope of the game, MAL then began to sponsor recruits who had many contacts, just not the $2200 investment money. Choosing her partners wisely, she fronted them the entry fee while they all went about recruiting people interested in joining the venture. How was the $17,600 payout at the top split? Half to the investor and half to MAL. Meetings were expanded from one night a week to four and the money rolled in!
The operation raced on for about ten months until one fateful evening the weekly Tuesday night meeting at MAL’s office was raided by the police. It seems someone had talked to the wrong person (whose brother was a cop) and a mole had been installed in the group. Two weeks later we were invaded.
“Where
is Anne Fowler,” one detective asked.
“She’s not here,” stammered a terrified group member who was so rattled that she peed her pants turning the office chair where she was sitting into a write off.
Succumbing to meeting and presentation exhaustion, MAL had fortuitously taken that particular night off and another person was substituting in her stead. The police thinking that they had nabbed “The Queen of Pyramids”, as Anne had become known, were most definitely not amused! But after receiving a panic-stricken phone call at her home, “The Queen” knew the jig was up.
Accompanied by her lawyer, the following day she visited the police station for booking. Unbeknownst to MAL, her group was just one of many operating in the GTA and police were currently on a mission to locate and destroy, determined to shut them all down. Perhaps they could make an example of the big fish they had just landed.
The day finally arrived when MAL met the judge. The court scene was like a keystone cop skit. Picture if you will, terrified defendants, all who’d been at the meeting that fateful night, as they sat shaking in their seats. The prosecuting attorney, a particularly nasty woman disliked by all who knew her, strode aggressively back and forth in front of the magistrate. Known for his sarcastic wit, the judge was not her fan either. The case was presented and MAL pled guilty.
Had punishment using the eighteenth - century guillotine been available in Canada, I believe the PA would have asked for it to be used. She was most certainly out for blood and looking for major fines to be levied. But as the judge looked down at the terrified defendants, he decreed that they had been sufficiently punished by losing their $2200 and fined them each a token $100.
With a
twinkle in his eye, he then turned to a tearful MAL and inquired, “Did we serve
tea and homemade cookies at our parties?” It seems that he had recently
prosecuted several groups who had evidently held their meetings in church basements and served
refreshments.
MAL felt it prudent not to tell him about the celebratory bottles of champagne and expensive lunches or just how much money she had made on the venture.
The judge then said, “Well I hope this will put an end to your social gatherings” and proceeded to fine MAL $1,200.
When
one considers the carefully hidden jack-pots she had accumulated, this was
certainly letting her off easy. The PA was apoplectic having expected a minimum
of a $25,000 penalty or even jail time to make a suitable example of this
woman’s evil deeds. We all left the courtroom that day and breathed a
collective sigh of relief.
………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Some of you may have read one of Brenda’s blogs called Fearless Friday and recognized my name from a submission that I made last February. You are now scratching your head and saying, “how do MAL’s exploits mesh with what we read in February about Anne’s humanitarian work in Honduras!?” To find the answer, you’ll need to read my memoir “I’ve Worn Many Hats”! Because the direction of my life changed so drastically, I wrote the book in two sections: life before Honduras and life after. The following reader response pretty much sums up the reaction I have received to the book:
“Her candid account spanning decades of a long bumpy life evokes many emotions; laughter, empathy, shock, admiration. As I read the first half, I kept going back, re-reading and thinking, “she did what?!” In the second half of the book, I discovered what had inspired her to make such a drastic life change and accomplish “all this.” Anne’s memoir is hard to put down, in fact I read it twice! Bravo!”
Born and raised in Toronto I grew up an only child in a traditional middle class Canadian family of the 40’s and 50’s. But my life has been anything but traditional! After finishing school my career included flight attendant with American Airlines, model, travel agent, world traveller, sales and marketing and almost 30 years in Human Resources as an entrepreneur/ business owner. I closed my company and retired in 2001 to take up another role, that of humanitarian. As someone once said when they described my various life pursuits during their introduction of me as that night’s speaker, “and she’s only 108 years old”! I live 6 months of the year in Honduras where I have spent the past 22 years developing a variety of community health and education programs.
My web site: http://anne.honduranhope.net has the link to order on Amazon and the book is available in both e book and paperback.
To
contact me: use Messenger under Anne Hamilton Fowler, or email: anne.fowler@xplornet.ca
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