I didn't want to leave my blog on a negative post, so I thought I'd hurry up and tell a nice story:
The day before yesterday my purse was stolen out of my car. It may not sound like that big of a deal, but it really put me through the ringer. I felt anger, I felt violated, I felt helpless, and then more anger. There was hardly any money in the purse, but everything in it had value to me. I started to really creep myself out thinking about some weirdo looking at my sweet Hadley's medicaid card that she was approved for with her autism diagnosis. Why would he need that? Why couldn't he give it back to me? Same goes for my license, my gift cards, my insurance card, my three prescriptions that were there, including my emergency inhaler, which total to about $50 in co-pays.
Again, the purse was not valuable, but all of those items were. My favorite black pen. My sunglasses. My makeup bag that only had my favorite lipsticks and a spare mascara in it. Those items are sitting somewhere, and I'm hoping the jerk just took my cards (which i cancelled immediately) and my pills (which won't do him any good, I'm sure...) and trashed the rest.
That night, I started to get a little panicked. This person had my picture and my address. He knows how old my daughter is and knows I also have a little son. I just prayed to my Heavenly Father that the thief would have no interest in me or my family and let us live our life. I felt much better the next morning, but I am still locking my front door at all times.
After the theft, I went on facebook and ranted a little bit about my stolen purse. The response was incredible. Yesterday, after taking some cash to get my new driver's license, I loaded up the kids to get a pumpkin at Fred Meyers. I was stopped at a stop sign when I looked at my wiper blades and saw a $10 neatly folded up. That is exactly how much money was stolen from my wallet.
After getting home, I heard a knock on my door and found nobody there, but found a white envelope with the words "Carly, sorry about your purse. You are loved!" In the envelope was $30 cash. Are you kidding me! How awesome is that??
Then, about half an hour after that, I get a text from a dear friend, who is also my sister's business partner, to check the porch. She had dropped off a gift card to Albertsons and a big bag of peanut M&Ms (my absolute favorite.)
My eyes welled up and I said a quick prayer of thanks. The generosity that my friends and neighbors offered me is a bit overwhelming. I would certainly hope that, had I the resources, I would do the same for one of my friends.
In the spirit of "paying it forward" I made an awesome batch (if I do say so myself) of chocolate chip cookies (the key is REAL vanilla, and being generous with said vanilla) and took them to a few friends and neighbors. It felt good to do something for someone else, rather than dwell on my (admittedly small) misfortune.
Today I feel great. I feel loved, I feel inspired to serve others.
Thank you to anyone who has said a kind word to me these last few days. It means more than you probably know. I want to rewatch all the conference talks and pay special attention to the talks about service and being more Christlike. I want to continue to serve my fellow man and to let go of material things that don't matter.
And on one more positive (material) note, I found a GREAT new purse at Gordmans, on sale for $23! Woo hoo!
1 comment:
Love this post!!
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