Like John Denver said, "Hey, it's good to be back home again". Sitting close to "Plain Jane Glory", a familiar band I have followed for years, I enjoy their covers of "Last of the Mohicans" and "Devil Went Down to Georgia", two songs I react to strongly. I am home to solve at least one of several mysteries. Last Saturday after buying a blue cobalt hand blown vase, my wallet went missing at the Muskegon Farmer's Market. I knew that wonderful handmade wallet was so boss it was trouble. Inside, stashed nine hundred dollars in large bills, Blue Cross Blue Shield Card, driver's license and two credit cards. The charge accounts weren't touched, so I am hopeful for a good outcome. A friend who works at the Farmers Market has searched all the garbage cans and dumpsters at the market, producing no leads. A friend I drove to Brooklyn in "No Sleep to Brooklyn" style searched my car entirely as she deep cleaned it. She found twenty dollars in change, two lost cell phones and no handmade wallet with large bills.
I am still hopeful for a good outcome or at least an answer to this riddle. Wind once blew a check for six thousand dollars out of my truck at a rest stop near Battle Creek. A letter from a couple living in Olivet arrived two days letter, a nice note enclosed. I deposited the money later that day and wrote a thank you reply I posted from Royal Oak.
My heart goes out to my two friends who had to work so hard when my wallet went missing and now worry on my behalf. I can always track my cellphone; maybe I can soon drop a tracking chip in my wallet. I thought about calling 911 and thought a lost wallet was too minor, and that's a mistake.
I called to leave a message for Officer Sunday, a pleasant sounding young man who explained my mistake when he called back. Sunday handles community policing for Downtown Muskegon and Nelson, the neighborhood where I live. One call to 911 and officers could have canvassed farmers and vendors looking for clues. Now the trail has gone cold. He made certain I had alerted my banks. "First, the thief blows the money. Then the thief hits the cards".
I am walking around the market, checking in with vendors and market staff to no avail. The man who sold me the vase asked for news and expressed regret although he shouldn't worry. I'll derive nine hundred dollars of delight over time from his vase. New money from my employer has arrived. It's as if I went on a binge of stupidity. It would not have been the first time.
Put back in service, my old wallet rests in my front right pocket, leather soft and flexible after years of use. I have to fill the slots with cards again as I collect them. There's far less money in the billfold.
On the way to Brooklyn, my friend picked up all the meals and her friend made me welcome in his home, asking for a little help around the place. In Brooklyn, I spent frugally, skipping souvenir shopping or calling cabs. On the way home, I bought meals from grocery store delis, surprisingly cheap. Better, I put down my passenger seats and slept at foot of Mount Tremper in the Catskills. The next night, I caught a few winks near Metzger Marsh, off Lake Erie and near Toledo. I slept soundly in the fresh air, one window rolled down a crack.
Maybe I bought a few lessons and a dose of wisdom with those hundreds that are now circulating in the universe. The best things in life, like a snooze in a Subaru, are free.
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