Dime Kneels All Loons

It started last week.

I have been finding dimes around the Mansion. No idea why this has started. Or if it will continue. Let the record show that I have not found a dime that I remember in the house since the several months right after my dad passed away the year The Pony was born. We found dimes all over the house then. So that's 18 years of finding no memorable dimes. Until last week. When I found four.

The first one was in the laundry. I didn't KNOW it was the first one. I probably would have forgotten about it if I hadn't found three more during the week. There I was, taking a load of clothes out of the washer and chucking them across the laundry room into the dryer when a dime clinked onto the gray ceramic tile floor. Making me, you know, do unexpected, unwanted exercise by kneeling down to pick it up. I figured that The Pony must have left a single dime in the pocket of his shorts that I took out of the washer, and it shook itself loose. I put it on the edge of the dryer until I finished loading, then took it to the kitchen and put it in the plastic Halloween cup under another plastic cup that sits on the back of the counter beside the stove.

The second dime appeared a day or two later, on the kitchen floor, over at the end of the counter. Smack dab in the walkway that one must navigate to go through the kitchen, past the rounded end of the counter, and hang a left to go out the kitchen door onto the back porch. I didn't know it was the second dime. I grumbled about Farmer H giving me unwanted exercise by dropping change from his pocket, and picked it up and put it ON the counter, over beside the cup-under-a-cup.

The third dime was on the basement floor, Wednesday, on the pebble-patterned press-down tile between the bottom step and a chair full of videos and my take-to-science-fair bag and my stretched-out blue sweatshirt. This dime got my attention, because it appeared out of the blue, after The Pony had gone to bed, after I had walked through that area to spend some late-night/early-morning time at New Delly in my dark basement lair. When I came out and went back to the TV area, that dime was there winking at me. I was a bit taken aback. I did not touch it. I let it sit until the next day, and asked The Pony if he had dropped it, or noticed it as he went by. He had not. Later that day, I picked it up and put it on the kitchen counter over by the box of Puffs With Lotion.

As I was making some pasta for The Pony's lunch on Saturday, he asked why I had two dimes sitting on the kitchen counter. "Oh, I just wanted to hang onto them in case I keep finding more. That's three, you know, this week."

The Pony fingered the one next to the cup-under-a-cup. "Is this the one from downstairs?"

"No. That one's over by the Puffs box."

"What does it mean, finding dimes?"

"I don't know. I looked it up on the internet after I found that basement one."

"Is it bad?"

"No. There are different theories."

"Like your conspiracies?"

"Uh huh. I can't believe your brother won't even talk to me about my conspiracies! He walks off or hangs up! You'd think he'd keep an open mind. Hey. Would you go put that load of towels and pajamas and pillowcases in the dryer for me?"

"Sure."

"Your noodles are almost done."

"Okay." The Pony turned on the dryer. He shut the lid on the washer. "Um...Mom?" He walked back into the kitchen. "Look what I found in the washer..."

Dime number four made its grand entrance.

"Okaaayyyy. Put it over there by the one next to that cup."

At this rate, I'll be $8.00 richer by the end of the year.