My Sin
By Dixie Darr
Cat's motto: No matter what you've done wrong, always try to make it
look like the dog did it.
Big excitement at the grocery store today. Some guy tried to steal two TVs. He loaded them into a cart and walked right out of the store. As I pulled into the parking lot, a big blonde twentyish guy (the perp) was running hell bent for leather into the surrounding neighborhood. A couple of store clerks were standing by the still loaded cart and the open and now abandoned car. Triumphant, they were yelling after the failed thief, “Pretty scared now, huh?” Assuming the car wasn’t stolen--and it was far too decrepit to be the object of anyone’s desire--the guy was toast.
Did he, I wonder, believe he had a calling to steal? Probably not. First, because he was inept. I think that what we are called to do, we are also good at. Second, I don’t think anyone other than Robin Hood sees criminal activity as a mission in life. I could be wrong about this.
The woman in front of me was so discombobulated by the goings on that she completely forgot what she came for. Not me. I scored my first Jonathan apples of the season (Yes!) and a bonus buy of three flower bunches for $10. When I got home and checked my receipt, I realized that the checker only charged me for one of the three bouquets, which meant that I unwittingly stole the other two. Oops. Now I know very well that what I should do is return to the store, confess my sin and pay the $6.66 I owe them. That’s not going to happen, even after seeing the significance of the amount I got away with.
I guess that makes me not much better than the TV guy, although my transgression was unwitting and clearly NOT MY FAULT. I still feel guilty, but guilt is far less inconvenient than driving all the way back to the store.
Copyright © 2003 Dixie Darr
2:32:48 PM 
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