I guess I had it coming

By Ivan Morgan

This is a tale of karma.

No such thing you say? Read on.

Years ago, my buddies and I would have breakfast together once a week at a diner downtown. One morning we had a grand laugh over an acquaintance who had made a big professional boo boo. A whopper. A humdinger! How we laughed. What a moron. Too funny.

After that great giggle I wandered down Water Street to check the mail. We had been waiting for a cheque for $25,000. This was years before direct deposits, and I was checking twice a day because the money was months overdue.

Let me explain. I worked for a private organization that did some contracting with the federal government. I’ll let you in on a secret. The feds were paid faithfully every pay period. They took their sweet time paying us.
We were owed $25,000 for services rendered (a fair chunk of change back then). This was money we used to pay our bills, ourselves, and keep the doors open. Weeks turned into months with no sign of a cheque. Which meant no pay. Which meant rent wasn’t paid. Christmas came and went. Today’s generation worries about anxiety and stress. I was the single father of four who hadn’t seen a paycheque in a while. Don’t be talkin’!

Long distance calls to Ottawa just brought more excuses and buck-passing. Except, of course, passing us our bucks.

So, when I opened the mailbox, imagine my surprise to see it sitting there. A cheque for $25,000. Groceries! Clothing! Beer! Gas! Oh happy day!

Not taking any chances, I slipped the cheque in the inside pocket of my coat and headed briskly for the bank, skipping down Water Street barely touching the sidewalk. I couldn’t resist the chance to show the cheque off to a buddy I met along the way.
It wasn’t there.

I started patting my coat pockets. Nothing. Then again. Nope. I tore off the jacket, frantically turning it inside out, freaking out my buddy.

I turned and ran faster than I had in decades back to the post office, my eyes glued to the sidewalk the whole way. Opened the mailbox. Nothing. Up to the counter. Has anyone passed in anything?
No.

Oh my God. What did I do with the cheque? Back out and up Water Street, the cold bony fingers of fear tightening around my chest. This is far and away the worst screw up I had ever made. This is the worst one I’ve ever heard of.

For 30 minutes I scoured back alleys, garbage cans and sewer grates, my mind racing with the consequences. What about the others depending on this money? I tried bargaining with the fates. I tried to position myself in the great scheme of things. Okay. No one is dead. No one is sick. No one is hurt.

What am I thinking? This is a disaster. I found myself rooting through the same trash canister for the third time, head in, chest deep, feet off the ground. When you do this, passersby avoid eye contact.

In my panic I had checked the post office twice already. Now strangely calm, I checked a third time. I am so dead. I could hear my co-workers, my family, my friends… You lost the cheque?

It was then I noticed a different person behind the counter.

He smiled. “Looking for something?” he laughed.

I lunged at the counter. My heart pounding, my mouth dry, I nodded.
“This?” he asked, producing the cheque.

The cheque!

Almost 25 years later it still ranks as one of the greatest moments of my life. The cheque had never left the building, sliding out of my coat right onto the floor. Some nameless saint had picked it up and passed it in. The person behind the counter I had asked earlier was a temp working while this guy was at an appointment. She had not been told a government cheque had been passed in.

Ever wanted to laugh, cry, cartwheel, die of embarrassment, scream, whimper, rage sing all at the same time? No? Lose a cheque for $25,000 for an hour then find it.

Once the cheque was safely in the hands of the bank, I staggered to a coffee shop, a shell of my former self, and sat where I could sip coffee and concentrate on breathing.

The karma? At that moment in walked the same fellow who had been the butt of our jokes that morning. He of the famous blunder sat at the table next to me and started reading his paper.
I knew what I had to do.

“Hey,” I said, leaning over to get his attention. “We had some laugh at your screw up.”

Having had a week of this already, he gave me a glower and went back to his paper.

Smiling and offering him the empty chair at my table, I was about to learn how good for the soul confession is.
“Want to hear a worse one?”

Ivan Morgan can be reached at ivan.morgan@gmail.com