Gratitude Monday: card on the table

I had a bit of a panic while I was in Dublin a few weeks ago. My route back to my hotel on the Saturday I’d been to Christchurch Cathedral to walk the labyrinth took me past a chocolate shop. I’d walked by a few Butler’s Chocolate Cafés before, but for some reason this one just pulled me in. I’d got whiskey for some friends back in the States, but it occurred to me that a box of chox would be an excellent choice for my Saturday-morning-breakfast friend.

So I went in and spent about 30 minutes wandering around. Hard choices to make, but eventually I found something suitable and went to pay. Butler’s doesn’t accept Amex, so I reached for my Visa card, which wasn’t there. I did that whole shuffling through every affinity card in my wallet thing, fishing in my bag and patting the back pockets of my jeans while the cashier waited patiently. Eventually I hauled out some actual, you know, cash and walked out with the present.

Well, in the mile or so to my hotel, I frantically sorted through how I’d need to report the lost card. Usually I carry a photocopy of my passport, Amex and Visa cards in my luggage, so I have all the digits I need if I have to deal with a loss, but this time I didn’t. Then I mentally walked myself through when I’d last used it; uh, oh…

The day before, on my way back from 14 Henrietta Street, just before I was nearly killed by a LUAS train, I’d stopped at a bookshop and found several books I couldn’t leave Dublin without. As I was paying for them, with my Visa, I was chatting with the owner about how far ahead Europe seems to be with its payment tech than the US. Their credit cards are moving to “contactless” payment, while our banks are still throwing their teddies out of the pram over switching to microchips. At the end of the conversation, there was an exchange about me leaving my card in the POS device. “Oh,” I said, “I’ll probably need this again, won’t I?”

But I didn’t recall putting it back in my wallet. Um.

So back in my hotel room, I desperately dumped my handbag out on the bed. Not there. I went through my coat pockets. Not there. I was considering how to contact CapitalOne to report it gone, when I reflexively patted my jeans—and not just the back pockets, where I usually jam things because manufacturers have taken to giving you useless half pockets in the front. And there it was, along with a fiver.

Epiphany dawned. In the afternoon after 14 Marietta Street and the bookstore, I’d decided to go back to St. Stephen’s Green in the sunshine, as opposed to the downpour of Thursday. And before I went out, in addition to my cameras, I decided to take some money and the Visa card, in case of needing some emergency gelato or anything. Naturally, when I got back to my room that day, I forgot about it and didn’t put them back in my wallet. (Not putting things back in their proper place is the cause of much of the anxiety in my life.)

So I berated myself, and expressed my thanks that all was, in fact, well. And that’s what I’m grateful for today: that buying a gift for a friend prompted the recovery of my credit card. And I hadn’t been as boneheaded as I thought.