Pennies for my thoughts.

Find a penny, pick it up...and save it. They just might be from Heaven.

Yesterday, out on my daily walk, I found a penny! Doesn’t matter what side was up. I found a penny! I was happy. It has been a while!! Pennies are scarce in these debit card days! Stuck it in my sports bra, and carried on. BOOM! Found ANOTHER penny! Same walk!! Suddenly I’ve got copper nips in my bra! A wealthy pair!

So what does it all mean?? Because everything has to mean something, right?

Is this double luck? Does the second penny cancel the luck of the first? Is it lucky at all? WTF is luck, anyway?

I don’t know about luck. It could be argued I’ve had a taste of both sides of the luck coin. I also am a proponent of making your own luck. Big fan of self advocacy, as well as others.

Back in 1991, I had just moved back to Minneapolis from Orlando after a stint working for the mouse. As in THE mouse, Mickey. (That’s a whole other substack). I was poor. Change jar poor. I would save my coins to scrape together $2 of gas. Take $1 out to hit a happy hour with cubed cheeses and stale chips. Enough to pay for a soda. If I went out with friends, I counted out $1.50 for a cheap beer, and hoped a friend would spring for #2. My friends were well aware of my coin jar. The running joke when we went out was “Mo could give a DIME!!!”. Funny, huh? Word play. But yeah…I gave a lot of dimes those days. And pennies. I can still smell my hands. It was rough. But HERE was something great that was also happening: EVERY SINGLE DAY for over a year…I found a penny. Some days 3!! It never happened if I was looking. Had to be random. There were times when the day was coming to a close,, and I thought my streak would end and KABLAM!! A penny at my feet. Even in the snow. Every single one delighted me! It was a sign to me! It was hope. It was FAITH in that jar. The belief that one day it would get better. It was being grateful for what I DID have. Counting those coins was like counting my blessings, and every single day I found a random blessing to add to my jar. To keep me going. To keep me seated at a table with friends, laughing.

So, back to my walk.

Back to those pennies.

I am currently in a rough patch, of sorts. Work has been scarce over the past couple years, compounded by being underpaid for a long time, forever actually. (And now the strike. And a $26,000 HVAC. And a $7,500 vet bill in April that left me with a dead dog. And a big $$$ surgery in July (cancer-free again! YAY). And now the new dog has to go to the vet…)

Those 2 pennies. They are a message from the past. Have faith, Mo! Find your faith!! (It may actually be appropriate to hear this paragraph in a full Irish lilt, thus adding to the mystical). Count your ever-lovin’ blessings, lass!! You’ve still got two coins to rub together, fer chrissake! Ye haven’t crumbled yet!! Keep goin’!!! This too shall pass…if ya let it!! But fer the love of all that is Holy…get yer arse out there and make yer own luck!! ATTA GIRL!!

Message received. The pennies have spoken.

But there’s more…

Get this:

My beautiful son, Cullen, came by today. No, his name isn’t Cullen Collins. That would be redundant. But Cullen James is a gorgeous name, isn’t it? Irish. He came by for a chat, but as per usual, there are requests. Usually of the financial variety. I get it. He’s 28. Around the exact same age as I was when I lived out of a jar. Times are ROUGH, especially for the young. His ask was this: “Do you have any change lying around that he could have?” (Insert my jaw drop here). Can you believe this shite?? The timing? I was flabbergasted!

Of all the things!! The pennies were not just for me. Those pennies from Heaven were for him as well!!

Crazy enough, I still have a mason jar of coins. Of course I do. It’s practical, and a great reminder of my salad days. (Sidebar: salad days is in reference to our “green” days. I had no green, and ironically couldn’t afford salad.) Anyway, I gave it to him. I also gave him this story. How at his age, I was in the same boat. These struggles are not unique! Sadly! Keep collecting those pennies! Update your gratitude list. Keep believing, while also making your own luck. It can always get better.

I do love when the Universe has irrefutable good timing, and meaningful messaging seems to explode in my face like a cold water balloon in a heat-dome.

Watching him leave with my jar made me not only proud of him, but of me. The young woman I was that held on. The older me who lets go.

Hubby just left with Walter to go to the vet. Time to go for another walk. My bra feels empty. HA!