Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Honesty

I'm listening to Alexander McCall Smith's The Right Attitude for Rain as I drive around. This is the third book in the Sunday Philosophy Club series with Isobel Delahousy.

Isobel is discussing theft with her niece Kat's deli employee. Coffee bags have gone missing from the deli again. Isobel muses on the subject, with careful deliberation, as she does on every subject.

I began to consider honesty, too. We aren't to take what isn't ours. There is no excuse for stealing. Stealing is violent; stealing is disrespectful; stealing takes a bit our our souls away when we take something that doesn't belong to us, etc.

After a few minutes of reflection, I reached into my purse to get a lipstick. As my hand moved around in my purse, I pulled out a ballpoint pen. Not recognizing the feel of the pen, I looked at the pen. Taped carefully to the side of the turquoise plastic pen was a neatly written note, "Do Not Remove".

I don't know whose pen it is. Where did I pick up this pen? Bank? Water Department? Office?
Can't return it. Don't know where the pen belongs.

Over the years, I've noted the synchronicity of my ranking/blasting/pontificating against something only to find myself guilty of the offense, too.

Human here,

St. Casserole

5 comments:

Cathy said...

A fellow PEN thief joins the ranks!

I posted a youtube video and thought of you :)

seethroughfaith said...

I am a teacher. At the end of almost every day I find pencils and pens amongst my things - though I have no recollection of borrowing them or even using them!!

weird :)

Di said...

I can certainly respect this. My other half always carries a pen with him and uses his own because he's so prone to stealing other peoples'.

(In other news, I love AMS's novels... they feel so peaceful to me.)

Lori said...

Seems to me that it's an unwritten universal law that all pens and pencils under 5 dollars are public property. They're like beer. You just borrow them for a bit.

Jennifer Garrison Brownell said...

I never buy pens or pencils, just pick them up some where. When i told this to my pen-snob pal she shouted "Aha! YOURE the one!" - Glad to hear I"m not the ONLY one....

Also. Borrow beer?