Musing on the value of a George Washington.
Buying champagne at the grocery.
That’s how this tale started.
“What’s your birthday?” the clerk asked.
“Seven, thirteen, nineteen sixty-something-or-the-other,” I replied.
“I’m a Seven-Thirteen, too” chirped the young fellow slipping the bottle, along with fruit, pretzels and a Coke Zero into a bag.
“I bet your year’s a lot different than mine.” My standard reply.
“Oh no,” the young guy smiled.
He smiled a lot this young fellow. We talked while he bagged. A permanent grin tattooed between his lower cheeks. The kind of smile that showed all teeth and most of his gums.
Once again shows there’s nothing to that horoscope cr*p.
That lovely thought goes through my head. This guy and I share the same birthday and he’s obviously one of these people who are perpetually happy. A guy making a few bucks while going to college who will be a success in life because he always sees the positive in every situation.
We head toward the door. He’s pushing my cart so I continue to babble.
For we are kindred seven-thirteen souls. I owe him that much.
“Hello sir,” young smiling Seven-Thirteen says in the direction of someone getting out of a car. (Someone with probably a very different birthday — five-seventeen or something).
“Nice guy,” happy young Seven-Thirteen says…edged with sarcasm.
Odd. Why would nice, grin-so-the-gums-show grocery-bagger care if someone didn’t respond to an attempted hello.
“He didn’t say anything?” I offer.
“No, he kind of snarled at me.”
“Was he old?” I ask. Knowing how young Seven-Thirteen can’t yet know what it’s like to be toward the end of life, feeling beaten up every day. And know the pain of looking at a young smiling fellow with the strength of 65 old fellows in his youthful left pinky who just told him “have a good day.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, he probably doesn’t feel all that great,” I offer to the young Seven-Thirteen.
We get to my car and he begins to transfer the bags from cart.
As he works, I root around for some money for a tip. I never have cash. EVER. But I happened to find a few dollar bills.
He pulled the back window shut and I handed smiling Seven-Thirteen a George Washington (Two, twenty-two).
At that moment, his grin pulled back three-times wider as he said,
“Thanks so much. That made my day.”
His comment caught me so completely off guard, I smiled and mumbled something like, “Sure thing, us Seven-Thirteens got to stick together.”
And he was gone.
He was gone before I could tell him his words of “thanks” just made mine.
Two days made in about fifteen seconds. Total cost = $1.00.
I bet you could even make somebody’s day on a lot less, don’t cha think?
