lost. and...

I go to Starbucks this morning with two newspapers to read.

I so rarely go that I still don't have the names of the sizes down. I ask for "the largest" coffee with steamed skim milk and a chocolate croissant.

I hear one of the baristas call my name and I pick up my two items. I sit down and a few minutes later hear my name called again. I look up as I am sitting nearby.  "Did you forget anything?" the barista asks. "No, I have everything," I reply.  And that's the end of our exchange.

I come home, and spend the rest of the day on the phone and computer.

Around 4:30 Alexander and I decide on sushi for dinner. I am not sure that sushi is the most appropriate last meal before fasting, but we are both in the mood for it. 

I go to get my wallet and it's not where it should be. I look around, and with a feeling of dread I begin to realize that my wallet is missing. Credit cards. Money. Driver's License. Insurance Card. BAFTA ID. Loyalty cards. 16 Handles and Dunkin Donuts Gift Cards. Pictures. And of course the wallet itself. 

I call Starbucks.  

"Hi. I think I may have lost my wallet today."

"Okay, we did find one. Can you describe it."

"Sure, it's pewter colored and it's rectangular shaped." (There's a long pause as if she's waiting for more of a description. Didn't I give her enough information? How many wallets do they find in a day?).

"Yes, we have it. It's in the vault. You can come get it tomorrow."

"Oh great, thank you. No, I'll be over in a few minutes to pick it up."

"Well, it's in the safe, and we can't open it until 8 in the morning."

I ask for the manager, who turns out to be the barista who helped me earlier in the day.

It turns out that she put my wallet in the "inner safe" around 4, and it's on a timer so no one can open it before 8 in the morning.  Then she adds, "I saw you and asked if you had everything you needed and you said you did."

"But I thought you were referring to the items I had just bought. I didn't know I had lost my wallet so I wouldn't have known you were referring to it.  Why didn't you just say, 'Did you lose your wallet?"

"I didn't want to shout out that I had found a wallet because then anyone could have claimed it."

"But you could have asked for their name as verification. Plus, you had my photo ID in the wallet."

"Oh, I guess I could have done that."

"Or at the very least why didn't you call me; my phone number is on my business card in my wallet?"  

Totally ignoring my irrelevant question, she adds,

"Just  come by tomorrow morning and it'll be here."

I am sincerely grateful. 

I just hope when I go back to Starbucks tomorrow it isn't someone else's pewter-colored wallet. No one ever did ask me for my name.