Sunday, August 7, 2011

Boiling Point and the Good in the World

Pretty much every morning, I stop by a bakery before work to get that good milk tea. It just so happened one morning that I was running late for work (I usually try to get there 10 minutes early). Normally, the lady hands back change before I get my drink. I gave her a $20, took my drink, and went off to work. Something missing? Yeah, I forgot to take my change. That's $20 for a $2 drink. It wasn't until 2 hours later when I looked in my wallet that I realized what happened.

Here's where the nasty takes over my mind. I assumed that since they were Chinese ladies, they would be stingy with this kind of situation. It has happened before when I was younger. My mom went back to a restaurant demanding that they give her back the proper amount of change and they denied ripping us off. Long story short: older Chinese people don't play games when it comes to money.

I was formulating all these situations in the case they denied not giving me back change. I was ready to break out some advance Chinese on them to stick it to them that I wasn't going to be messed with. I had all these nasty words ready to be unleashed. I was ready to point at the cameras and tell them to check everything. I was ready to explode.

On my break, I walked back to the bakery and approached the counter. I first calmly, yet had a hint of anger in my voice, explained the situation. To my complete surprise, the lady smiled and told me she remembered me. She said I walked away before she could go get the change for me. I smiled and apologized. She gladly gave me back the $18 that I was supposed to receive. I thanked her like four times on my way out.

It wasn't until I left that I realized what a terrible person I am. I thought the worst in humanity and didn't once think of God's love in others. I put my head down in shame that I was taken over by these wicked thoughts.

God is good. Always.

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