Pacific Tales

Pacific Tales

I’ve just completed the Mentor Summit and Mentor Hall of Fame Meeting in San Francisco, and a day’s presentation for Rob Nixon’s Coaching Club in Honolulu. And now we’re taking a week off on the beach.

We’re at the Sheraton Waikiki, where we stayed a couple of times over 30 years ago. Ordinarily we’d be elsewhere, but the function was held here and they’ve refurbished the suites. We have one balcony in the bedroom that shows the sunrise, and another in the living quarters that shows the sunset! Twenty-five stories below, we can watch giant, green sea turtles meander in the crystal clear water. If you’re lucky, they’ll swim up to you when you wade in.

Unlike so many popular tourist destinations, the food here is great (as it was in San Francisco, where we dined again at Gary Danko, for my money on of the dozen best restaurants in the US). So far, Roy’s has been our favorite here with some incredible fish, but we’re off to Alan Wong’s tomorrow which has a sterling reputation, so we’ll see.

Sitting in church before mass on Sunday here, I realized that my wallet was gone. It must have fallen out of my pocket in the cab. My wife asked if I wanted to leave, but I observed that church was probably where I belonged at the moment. Fortunately, I usually keep a hundred dollars of bills in a side pocket, and I had money for the collections and a cab home. I tried to enjoy the service and the sermon was quite well done.

I notified the cab company (“Sir, we have 500 cabs, but I’ll put out a text message for you”) which is actually called The Cab Company. I notified Cori, the guest services manager who had escorted us to our suite when we arrived, in case I needed to get some cash. Then I called the credit card companies, which took only 20 minutes for all of them. One woman asked, “Are you all right?” I was very impressed. Amex will have three different, new cards to me today, Tuesday, by Fedex, at no charge.

My wife remarked on how well I had handled things, and said that she hoped whoever found the wallet could really use the $800 inside of it.

We hit the beach.

At about 4 pm we returned, to a blinking message light. It was Cori. “I have your wallet,” she practically screamed, “the cab driver dropped it off and I have his number for you.” I quickly called to ask him to return for a reward. He hasn’t done so yet.

The worst thing about losing my wallet would be a few photos from 30 years ago that can’t be replaced. My car dealer would replace the registration, and AAA would replace my license. Various club memberships would easily be restored. The money can always be replaced. We have to keep things in perspective.

And the greatest perspective is that most other people are like you, not damaged somehow, and willing to do the right thing. I realized that I had returned money, airline tickets, and all sorts of things I’ve found. Why wouldn’t I? Why wouldn’t the cab driver?

We’re off to the beach again, to the turtles, to the Pacific.

© Alan Weiss 2010. All rights reserved.