People pay me to sign their documents, What am I? If you guessed Notary Public then you are 100% correct. I am a Notary Public and I service clients in Georgia!
What is a Notary? A Notary Public is a citizen of a city and state who has been authorized by a court clerk to witness individuals sign important documentation. There are several facets to being a notary, but overall we witness individuals legally sign documents.
In 2022 I decided to become a notary once I realized the shortage of notaries in the area that I lived. I needed a document notarized and assumed that a simple Google search would lead me to a plethora of notary publics – to my surprise I was wrong. There were only two in the vicinity of where I lived, one of which only opened on certain days and times. At that moment I was prompted to research “How to become a Notary Public”. I will share the steps I took to actualizing the process in another post.
My first notarial act happened a month after I received my official signature and stamp! I was on my way back to Denver with my children and stopped at the UPS store in Camp Creek, a shopping center/mall strip in East Point. The first thing I saw once I entered the store was a sign that read: THE NOTARY IS OUT AT THIS TIME! I smiled and said, “interesting” to myself then took a picture of the sign. Seconds later, a man walked in and after being asked how could he be helped, he said, “I need a Notary”. Immediately I became a little nosey and slowed down my pace towards the door, contemplating if I should offer my service. The clerk said the notary was not on site today and the man reacted with a complaint about taking off work to handle business, wasting his time, and how hard it was to find a notary. In the midst of their conversation I wanted to interject and help but was nervous! What if I try to help this man but his credentials aren’t legit? Yet, my courage took over in that moment and I blurted out, “I am a Notary” and he said, “For real?!” I smiled, answered yes and asked to see what he needed notarized. As I reviewed the document I asked, “Do you have your drivers license with you?” He replied, “yes, of course.”the document happened to be an affidavit and legally, I was able to notarize it for him – and for a fee of course!
“People pay me to sign stuff!”, was my first thought after being paid AND thanked one million times, the level of appreciation and gratitude lifted up my spirits that day, which happened to be a very challenging one – but that’s another story for a different day.
iNotate It 