"Three Towels and a 25 cent Newspaper"

This morning I came upon this talk given by Richard C. Edgley. In it he shares two experiences. One in which he learned and one he shared the virtue of honesty. He begins by telling us the experience he had between his father and himself upon arriving home from a summer job at Jackson Lake Lodge, located in Moran, Wyoming. 

  "...after the miracle of arriving home, my father came out and happily greeted me. After a hug and a few pleasantries, he looked into the backseat of the car and saw three Jackson Lake Lodge towels—the kind you cannot buy. With a disappointed look he merely said, “I expected more of you.” I hadn’t thought that what I had done was all that wrong. To me these towels were but a symbol of a full summer’s work at a luxury hotel, a rite of passage. Nevertheless, by taking them I felt I had lost the trust and confidence of my father, and I was devastated.

The following weekend I adjusted the plywood floorboard in my car, filled the radiator with water, and began the 370-mile (595-km) round trip back to Jackson Lake Lodge to return three towels. My father never asked why I was returning to the lodge, and I never explained. It just didn’t need to be said. This was an expensive and painful lesson on honesty that has stayed with me throughout my life."

When I read this all those moments that I felt were "a rite of passage", and my perception of entitlement came to mind. So many little things that have etched away my self intergrity concerning honesty. I have much to work on and be repentant for.  

The second part solidified to me how many times I act before regarding the consequences. Not only those that are dolled out by society/family/friend but more importantly the damage I bring upon my own conscience and  spirit. 

 "Some 30 years ago, while working in the corporate world, some business associates and I were passing through O’Hare Airport in Chicago, Illinois. One of these men had just sold his company for tens of millions of dollars—in other words, he was not poor.

As we were passing a newspaper vending machine, this individual put a quarter in the machine, opened the door to the stack of papers inside the machine, and began dispensing unpaid-for newspapers to each of us. When he handed me a newspaper, I put a quarter in the machine and, trying not to offend but to make a point, jokingly said, “Jim, for 25 cents I can maintain my integrity. A dollar, questionable, but 25 cents—no, not for 25 cents.” You see, I remembered well the experience of three towels and a broken-down 1941 Hudson. A few minutes later we passed the same newspaper vending machine. I noticed that Jim had broken away from our group and was stuffing quarters in the vending machine. I tell you this incident not to portray myself as an unusual example of honesty, but only to emphasize the lessons of three towels and a 25-cent newspaper."

I pray that I'll keep his shared lesson always in my mind. For it's the little things that create the holes in my spirit and cause me to be complacent with my actions.