Oh, The Places My $20 Will Go!

Have you ever lost a twenty-dollar bill and wondered where it ended up? A few months ago, I lost a $20. A crisp, green Benjamin – gone. I had found it only hours before in a pocket of a coat I hadn’t worn since I was commuting on a train – pre-COVID! Found money! So, I curled it up and put it in the pocket of my hoodie as my husband and I prepared for a Saturday hike into Old Town. I intended to buy us coffee with my money. I checked on it a few times while we strolled and then suddenly it was gone! I retraced a few steps and then gave up. It was “found” money after all!

I flashed back to a memory I had of losing my favorite doll, Jennifer, when I was four or five. I’d left her at some rest stop between Virginia and Tennessee and only realized it twenty miles after leaving. My father’s reaction? Sorry, he was not turning back for ol’ Jenny! My mother’s reaction? “Just think of the happy, little girl who will discover Jennifer and take her on lots of new adventures!” For the next twenty miles, my mother and I spun one wild tale after another about how much fun Jennifer must be having. (My mother had a fantastic imagination and was a master of the distraction technique.)

So, I wondered, where might my perfectly good $20 bill travel? Here a few stories my twenty-dollar bill inspired:

1. A grandmother tucks it safely beneath her shoelaces. She decides to treat her ten-year-old granddaughter to a trip to the Dollar Store for her birthday. Two dollars for each year.
2. A nurse picks it up, eager to spend it on that teddy bear in the hospital gift shop for the daughter of her latest COVID19 patient. Everyone needs something to hold onto, she figures.
3. A soldier, home on leave, stashes it in his mother’s Bible before leaving for deployment in Iraq. “We’ll spend it on lunch when I return,” he tells his mother.
4. An unemployed Dad finds it buried beneath some leaves after praying for a sign that things will turn around. Praise Be!
5. A coach finds it and drives to the nearby baseball field where he treats his team, despite their barnburner loss, to two large pies with extra pepperoni.
6. A fast-food worker carries it with her to the sandwich shop where she works at Union Station. On a break, she drops it into the case of the blind violinist who exquisitely performs the Minuet by Boccherini, her favorite.
7. A red-headed boy discovers it then runs after Uncle Louie’s ice cream truck and spends it on two firecracker popsicles and two Dreamsicle push-ups. He and his three sisters sit down on the porch stoop and enjoy!
8. A firefighter picks it up while battling a brush fire near the walking trail. He spends it at the high school fundraising car wash where he drives the dirty ladder truck through, requiring the entire football team and a carton of sponges to wash it clean.
9. Eighty-year-old Hank, also known as Mr. Cat Man, finds the $20 bill peeking out beneath his favorite bench on the trail. He considers buying a fifth of Wild Turkey but decides to splurge on Queenie and Vamp with two cases of Purina Fancy Feast, salmon flavored.
10. A neighbor picks it up and promptly gives it to another neighbor who gives it to another. The money passes along from one hand to the next, never finding anyone with enough need to spend it until it is placed, along with a prayer, into a collection plate on Sunday.
11. A commuter slips it into the pocket of the coat of a fellow commuter, who unknowingly carries it home and promptly hangs it up in her closet. A year later, after the pandemic, she discovers it but unfortunately, or fortunately, loses it on an afternoon walk with her husband.
12. Your story here!

For me, this was $20 well spent! It proves my premise that inspiration is everywhere. Please vote for your favorite story or add your own. I’m curious! Plus, I’m only a few stories shy of a perfect twenty.