Small Town Honesty

Coping: With Small Town Honesty [This is a happily positive report from George Ure's Urban Survival's  usually very dire forecasts, http://urbansurvival.com/week.htm found  in today's piece entitled, "Competing Tipping Point Theories" ] From George Ure: Interesting thing happened last weekend:  Elaine had gone to town shopping and at the end of her usual jaunt through the downtown Kroger's store, after checking out, she noticed that a ring she'd been wearing was no longer on her finger. Figuring that it must have fallen off somewhere in the store, she retraced her steps and still couldn't find it, so she left her phone number and such with the Customer Service Department at Kroger's in downtown Palestine, TX. She was very bummed out about it - so much so that we were making plans to buy a replacement.  Not that this was a huge high-priced 'Lexus-on-a-finger' kind of a ring mind you; just a ring with several small stones on it, but one that she'd had for a long time, and which had a lot of sentimental value - the kind that can't really be replaced.  About we would have been  able to do was find some kind of a substitute. Then it happened:  The phone rang at about 1 PM Tuesday and the customer service folks at Kroger's reported "We've found your wife's ring...it had fallen off her finger while she was in the produce department..."  We hopped in the car, went to town, armed with a small reward, although the ring had been turned in by an anonymous passing shopper who'd spied it.  And that was that. --- Point of telling the story?  Well, I figure it speaks volumes about honesty out here in the East Texas:  People out here routinely honest - it's not something they have to be reminded of - it's just how they're wired. Incidents like this - where a stranger finds something that's not theirs, does the right thing and turns it in to Customer Service, which in turn, does the right thing --- well, it restores my faith in fellow humans, at least in our community.  Of course, I still run out of trust about three counties away from here, before getting to Austin andlong before getting anywhere near Washington, for example. We've lived plenty of other places - up and down the West Coast, in Florida, and so on - and while I'm not saying the ring wouldn't have been found in a big city, I'm pretty sure the odds would be a lot lower.  Out here they are currently running 100 percent on the side of honesty. No, Elaine's not going to wear that ring again shopping, but it underscores something I've suspected about small towns, Texans, Kroger's staff, and the South.   Evidence, if you will. America's still got honorable, honest, hard-working people who instinctively do the right thing and as a Nation that's a helluva lot more important than all the paper and zeroes you can dream up.  Thank you, Kroger's in Palestine, Texas. From:   http://urbansurvival.com/week.htm   __________________________________________________________________   Easily grow your own vegetables anywhere .          Click here: Easy Victory Garden http://www.food4wealth.com/?hop=cielos