Safe and Sound

I glance at my favorite ring. The one I wear every day now. The large pear shaped blue topaz is gone. The opal band looks bereft without it. I think of all the groceries I have sacked in the last four hours. Wishing I had not cleaned the storeroom too now. Want me to help you look? My manager asks. I am a check-out girl who also had to clean a freezer today. It could be in six dozen places, all of them in this store. Or at home, under a couch, or swept up in a vacuum bag. This is the day the cleaning lady comes and she only vacuums. I blink back tears. It could have gone home with a customer. My beautiful blue topaz will be thrown away by someone Who might not even see it. Maybe it is in a paper bag crease. Believe it or not someone has found it and brings it back to the store. Here it is now, safe and sound, at the jewelers, getting new prongs. People are basically not only good, but sometimes great.