Yesterday my wife and I were at a grocery store and found a $50 dollar bill on the floor. As my wife picked it up we both looked at each other with the same thought, "can we keep it?" We looked around to see if anyone was there searching for it but there was no one. As we walked towards the aisle that had the item we needed, we went through all the reasons why we should just keep it. Nobody would come for it. If we turned it in to the store, the clerk would just keep it. All real possibilities, and all very tempting. But we finally looked at each other one more time and knew what we had to do.
We took the money to the customer service desk and told the lady what happened. She took down our names and number and told us she'd let us know if someone came for it. We left feeling a little better knowing we had done the right thing, but not expecting to hear anything more about it. Instead, a little while later when we were back home my wife got a phone call. It was the lady who had lost the money. It dropped out of her pocket while she took her keys out. She thanked my wife over and over again for turning in the money, crying as she did so. It was a great warm fuzzy moment for us. We almost didn't do the right thing, but I'm glad we did.
5 comments:
Hooray! What a cool story! And what a good way to start the Christmas season!
Today as I was driving home I had to swerve to miss a board with a nail in it. Normally I would mentally berate the person that left it there and go on my merry way, but today for some reason I was compelled to stop, turn around, and go back and pick it up so no one else would run over it and flatten a tire.
It's a disease, and it can't be stopped!
Cameron, you are a better person than I, because I can honestly say that if I found a $50 bill sitting on the floor of a store, it would disappear in to my wallet so fast one might think it had always been there.
By telling this story, however, you have shamed me in to rethinking that approach. The truth is - this is stealing. Just because I wouldn't stick a gun or knife in to a person's face and demand the money doesn't make it any less of a crime. One person inadvertently and without knowing it loses a bill of value; another person finds that bill. You did the right thing, and because you admitted it - you are forcing me to realize that the right thing is, indeed, the right thing.
As for the nail-in-the-board-in-the-road, I do that, too. Likewise cardboard that flies of uncovered trucks and any other muck that ends up a potential road hazard.
Hey, if it takes shame to change the world, then I guess that's what it takes. In fact, it was probably shame that made me do it too.
It was really awesome that she was able to call us and express her gratitude. My wife said that the lady was pretty surprised that someone had turned it in.
I only wish my first thought had been to turn it in, rather than can I keep it.
What you did in turning the money in was simply to follow your divine and loving consciousness. But money itself is not the root of all evil. The scriptures inform us and intelligently so that the love of money, greed, coveteousness, materiality, idolatry is the root of evil insofar as these qualities are the antithesis of the Divine Mind, Love and prevent us from knowing our highest selfhood as the image and likeness of Divine Mind. Fathom this and you will not only know yourselves as God knows you but you will know how Jesus healed the sick. Real spiritual consciousness empowers us to do the greater good and extraordinary things.
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