Found Money
When I got to the Starbucks, I opened my car door and on the ground, right next to where I was putting down my foot was a small, woven, zippered pouch. I picked it up and found a little over $35 inside. There was also a buy-8-get-one-free card from a local sub shop. But nothing else. The parking lot I was in was between a strip mall and a Buffalo Wild Wings and there was no way of guessing which shop or restaurant the owner may have visited. I thought of leaving it on the ground in case someone came back to look for it. But more likely someone else walking by would have just taken it. I thought of going to the sub shop the card was from, but the card was just a business card that they used a rubber stamp to track purchases on, so they wouldn’t know whose it was. I worried that some kid had worked hard to make the money and would be really upset or discouraged about losing their money. By the style and lack of other contents, I figured it was a teen boy’s. But the tag inside said it was handcrafted in Bolder CO, so I figured any teen boy who had something handcrafted in a ski town likely wasn’t too hard-up. Then I remembered that more than once – particularly when I was young and more careless – I had lost money myself and said a prayer that the money would be found by someone who needed it so they could use it for something more important than I was going to spend it on. So I decided to just keep it with a clear conscience. I used it to get my scans done and buy some fruit and cheese to go with my coffee while I worked.
Is it weird that I think maybe that money was the universe’s way of sending my prayer back to me? I still hope the kid who lost it isn’t too upset over it!