Good People

Life, at its best, is a balance.

A few days ago, when my son was robbed, a worry-seed took root within me. I was not haunted, or overcome with anxiety, but I did worry at odd moments, that something terrible might actually happen to this man I had raised. I considered the crime rates, and the long list of TRUE CRIME STORIES (!!) recounted with studio-bred intensity on the evening news. I thought there might be too much evil in the city, that demons waited around every corner. Who could be safe in such a place – especially the young, who thought themselves immortal? I remember the casual confidence, believing that nothing could happen on such a beautiful night.

Then I received a message on my answering machine. A man was asking for my son, saying that he might have found something that belonged to my son (yeah, just like in that insurance commercial). When I returned his call, he told me that he had been biking that morning, and happened to see a flash of color on the ground (I wish my eyes were that strong). He stopped and picked up my son’s bank card. He was calling to return it.

The fact that he bothered at all makes him eligible for an enameled Good Citizenship pen, but, he went further. Since he had no contact information, this man actually looked for my son on the net, and finding a disconnected number, called people with our last until he reached me. That he went to those lengths to return my son’s property made me tear up (OK, I cry when I see Hallmark commercials … all of them). Where the robbers were immoral, this man was honesty, personified.

My spirits lifted, I thanked him. We commiserated about the state of things, me telling him of the robbery, him relating his own similar victimization in Istanbul (robbed by five men in Turkey, for crimey’s sake!). He cut up the card for me, since it had been cancelled, and wished my son well. I remembered falling asleep to a radio program the previous night, where a guest explained this theory that angels and men were closely related. He believes that angels walked among us, and we did not know because they look just like us.

Life is a balance. Sometimes we must wait for the scales to shift, and sometimes it happens so quickly that we can hardly overlook the message.

When next you find yourself believing that you are surrounded by assassins, try to stand up and take an actual count.