Story by Dillon Pilorget
Photo courtesy of Flickr
I awoke to find a voicemail on my cell phone. I was visiting my girlfriend’s family in San Diego for spring break, so I was surprised to see a number from the University of Oregon in my missed call log. I dialed my voicemail and stood in disbelief as I listened to my boss from First-Year Programs, Marilyn Linton, explain that a man from San Diego had found my wallet. His name was Tony, and he would make the first time I lost my wallet into a day that I’ll never forget.
I had spent the day before on Coronado Island with my girlfriend, Sara. We rented a pedal-kart to ride around the island in, and were enjoying our freedom from the burdens of school. The warm sun was a relief after a long winter in Eugene, and it seemed that nothing could go wrong that day. Until it came to lunchtime. We found a nice little pizzeria and enjoyed a few slices. Everything was peachy until it came time to pay.
I reached to my back pocket and found it empty. In a frenzy I looked around the ground under our table. My wallet was nowhere. I ran to Sara’s car, but my wallet was not there either. I went to the cart rental kiosk and asked if anyone had turned anything in, but again, the answer was no. The girl working at the kiosk offered to let me borrow a bike to retrace the route we had taken, and I set out to scour the island’s streets. After an hour and a half of disappointment on every corner, I decided to give up the hunt. While Sara reported my lost wallet to the local police, I called my bank to have my cards canceled. With our tails between our legs, we left the island without much hope for my wallet’s return.
The next morning, I listened to my boss Marylin’s voicemail and quickly jotted down the phone number that the man who found my wallet had left with her. I dialed it, and Tony answered. With a voice as friendly as Fred Rogers, he confirmed that he had my wallet and we discussed where to meet so that I could pick it up. After learning that he had gotten a hold of my boss by finding her business card in my wallet, I decided to come all the way to him since he had already gone so far out of his way to make sure I got what I had lost.
It was a long drive to Tony’s house. He lived on the complete opposite side of the city from Sara, and the trip took almost an hour one way. While Sara drove, we wondered about what might be missing from the wallet, just who this Tony guy was, and what we could do to thank him for his kindness. We pulled up to his little house, and he was outside working on his truck. He approached me as if we were old friends, and his meaty hand shook mine while he smiled sincerely. He handed me my wallet and said jokingly, “You’ve got some weird stuff in there, man.” I can only assume he was referring to my wallet size geologic time scale. I looked inside to find everything present and in tact. It was as if it had never fallen out of my pocket.
In thanks, I took out the forty dollars that sat in my wallet and held it out to Tony. He looked shocked, as if the thought of a reward had never crossed his mind. He humbly refused for a number of minutes, until I finally insisted hard enough to make him accept. He said one of the most gracious thank yous I have ever heard, and we shook hands a final time. Sara turned the car around, and we left, and Tony went back to working on his car like this exchange was nothing out of the ordinary, nothing to be particularly proud of.
I was proud for him. Though I have no idea who Tony is, or what he does, or where he has been, I do know that he saved my skin and turned my spring break around, simply because it was a kind thing to do. The right thing to do might have been to pick the wallet up and turn it into the police station. But Tony did the kind thing: he hunted me down and made sure I got my wallet back.
I never knew how scary losing a wallet could be until I had done it for the first time, and I had not expected anyone to care until there was Tony. I will not forget Tony for doing what so many others would not. It would have been easy for him to ignore my wallet on the ground, or to take the cash and throw the rest away, but I honestly believe that he never thought of either of those things. I thank him for saving me from renewing my drivers license, having to buy a new wallet, and from missing the pictures and memories that stayed inside my old one. Mostly, I thank him for reminding me that good people still exist, and that you can count on someone to help you. I hope that I get the chance to pay his kindness forward someday. I hope that I can be a Tony.