Saturday, October 10, 2009

My mother did not raise a thief...

Today I needed to get a few things at the hardware store for the house. I went to Lowe's, which is closer to our home than Home Depot. I sort of like Home Depot better, but I was all about finishing my errands quickly this afternoon. I needed to get a fitting for our hot water heater and some cleaning supplies. I quickly located what I needed and went to the check-out line. I showed the clerk my retired military ID and received a 10% discount (Home Depot offers the same discount). The clerk put my things into a plastic bag, I took the bag and headed to my car.

I opened the trunk and put the bag therein. I stopped D&W (local grocery store) on the way home to get some stuff for dinner and arrived back home. I pulled my trusty BMW into the garage, popped the trunk, took the bags out of the trunk and placed them on our kitchen counter. I placed the perishable items recently procured from D&W away and then I started to go through the plastic bag from Lowe's. Much to my surprise, there were more things in there than I had purchased. Specifically, there was weather stripping, a trowel, a tape measurer and some sanding blocks. I realized that these items were potentially purchased by somebody else and not taken away. The clerk simply added my items to the bag with these four items and off I went.

I could keep the items and nobody would be the wiser. However, as the subject line of this post states, my mother did not raise a thief. While I could use the weather stripping, sanding block and the tape measurer, I did not pay for these items. They are not mine and I need to return all the items back to the rightful owner. In the next day or two, perhaps when I am driving home from work, I will stop at Lowe's and return these items. Doing the right thing is not always easy, but it is always the best thing to do.

2 comments:

NigFred said...

Well done.

Lisa said...

We walked out of the grocery store once, after unloading and paying for our groceries, with a bottle of Vanilla that I'd overlooked. As soon as we found it, we went back in to the store to pay for it. The lady at the customer service counter seemed genuinely surprised by our honesty. I thought I was teaching Kat a really good lesson. Turns out she learned two: it's good to be honest, and most people aren't, apparently. :-)

Good job, Commander. Way to set a good example.