And the movies brought into my line of vision the no-nonsense strong, stand-up women with the big shoulder pads. I’ve always admired the fighter, the spunky gal, and especially identified with in-your-face redheads. Women with almost pugilistic nerve. Later in my business life, my two top role models were women who stood their ground and weren’t afraid to make waves or ruffle a few feathers while they were doing it. (Please excuse the mixed metaphors.) Anyway, you can see where I’m coming from. I like women with nerve.

So you can’t blame me when I thought I’d found a new role model in Madame Villaran Nenita, widow of the assassinated former Minister of Finance in the Phillipines. Nenita sent me a very nice e-mail this week. At first I was worried about her losing her husband in such a horrible way, but I didn’t feel sorry for very long, because I soon learned she had inherited 19.3 million dollars from her late husband.

Unfortunately, her dreadful in-laws were apparently so greedy she had to move from Manila to Cote d’Ivoire for her peace of mind. But don’t worry, she managed to send the cash in a “metallic trunk box” under diplomatic coverage to be deposited with a security and finance company in her new homeland. Thank goodness. I was worried there for a minute. But I should have remembered those spunky gals always find a way.

Now what did this have to do with me? Well, my new friend Nenita needed to keep her late husband’s family from getting their grubby hands on the money, so the box could only be sent, on request from Nenita, to a business representative in a foreign country. Aha. I began to have an inkling.

My new best buddy asked if I would contact the company as Nenita’s business partner, and they would send the 19-plus million to me! Wow, now I am the business partner of the possessor of 19.3 million somethings (she never said what kind of dollars they were). Nenita would then come to meet me and see that I got 15% of the cash for my trouble. My math stinks, but I know that isn’t peanuts.

I don’t know how Nenita found me, but I’ve always promptly returned the money I borrowed from my friends and I’m careful with my own bank account, usually about $8.95. So why not me? Anyway, Nenita is now awaiting my urgent response.

What imagination! What chutzpah! What nerve! What bad spelling and grammar!

Of course Nenita isn’t anybody’s widow. She’s probably a young man in a dingy room in Nigeria who has found out if he sends enough of these e-mails, a percentage of people will reply and somehow be inveigled into sending some of their own money in good faith funds, to be returned when the magical box of 19.3 million is opened in Hoboken, NJ or Boulder, CO. 

Surprise! Guess what? No box, no money, no Madame Villaran smiling at you as she steps off the plane. You have just been scammed.

Such scams, and many directed specifically at seniors via phone, mail or a knock on the door, are growing so rapidly that there are many thousands of Web sites devoted to the problem.

Nenita’s is called the Nigerian Letter Scam because although these are Internet appeals, they originally arrived in the mail. (Go to www.usps.com to see actual examples of the snail mail letters.)

If someone has contacted you and offered you money just for helping transfer money, diamonds or other riches to your account for safekeeping, beware. It’s not a dream come true, it’s a nightmare.