Grace

I saw a long, fat, black-beaded wallet at the cash register where I was paying for my bar cookies at Whole Foods this afternoon.

I looked questioningly at the man who had just paid ahead of me, but he shrugged. “It’s not mine,” he said, quietly smiling at me.

“Here,” I said to the girl taking my money. (“That will be $8.15,” she said, and when I told her I’d give her the fifteen cents she said what they all say now, the clerks who can no longer count back change, “I’ve already put it in the system.”)

“Someone left this,” I said. “Save it for when she comes back looking for it.”

Just then, the most frantic woman came rushing up.

“Don’t worry!” I said, “We have it!”

“Oh,” she said. “I’ve been searching my car and this is the last place I was. Other than the bank. I was at the bank before coming here, and there was so much money…”

“Don’t worry,” I said, putting my arms around her. “He is with us. He is with you.”

I would have said more but for the line behind us, stomping their feet as they do. “Patience,” I thought. “Just have a little patience, people.”

And then I remembered myself, driving up 75th Street on this day of 94 degree Fahrenheit temperatures, where someone was crossing without waiting for the little lit up figure to come up on the traffic light. “You asshole,” I mutter, under my breath, because I’m hot, and crabby, and I have to wait for this man who will not obey the rules.

It is so easy for one good thing to be undermined by the bad thing I’ve done just before. “Lord,” I pray, “give me the grace to be gentle with others.”

Amen.