October 8th, 2022
“If you have money, consider that perhaps the only reason that God allowed it to fall into your hands was in order that you might find joy and perfection by throwing it away.” – Thomas Merton, from his book Seeds of Contemplation
Every now and then, I go online to look at the entries to the record of our checking account. Karin and I have a joint account, and I scanned the list of recent purchases. One of them puzzled me. It was for Great Clips, the place where I usually get a trim. The debit was for $60.00. I couldn’t figure out how the haircut could have cost that much. I have hardly any hair left to cut. I happened to have a rumpled copy of the receipt. After I read it, I thought to myself,
“Oops.”
Later that day, Karin and I were taking our grandson, Asher, for a walk. As we we wandered down the street, I told Karin,
“Hey, I screwed up when I went for my haircut.”
Karin gave me a puzzled look, and asked me,
“How?”
“I made a mistake when I gave the stylist a tip. I typed one too many zeroes.”
Karin laughed, and asked me,
“So, how much did you give her?”
“I wanted to give her $4.00. I gave her $40.00 instead.”
“How much was the haircut?”
“$20.00.”
She rolled her eyes, “So, you gave her twice what the haircut cost?”
“Uh, yeah.”
We walked a bit further. Karin became thoughtful.
She said, “Maybe the woman needed the money. Maybe she was struggling to pay some bills, and you happened to give her what she needed.”
“That could be.”
Sometimes throwing away money is okay.
Frank is Emptiness 