My 53 cent moral dilemma

So  I walk down the hill to the supermarket to get some eggs, and while I am looking at the sausages  - cases of sausages – what it gods name kind of country is this -  I see a row of packages to the side called  “Angus Top Sirloin burgers”.   Yikes.  Like everything else in Sydney, Expensive.   Each package contains 4 small burgers, at eight and nine dollars a package.   Then I see that there is one package that has four burgers in it, but is priced at only 53 cents.   Hmmm.  That’s odd.  Not marked down.   It looks like the weighing machine just made a mistake.  Another Hmmm.  What I should do is call someone over and notify them of the mistake.   On the other hand, I could get 4 burgers for only 53 cents.  Not yet deciding, but sort of deciding, I grab the package and get a couple more things, eggs, bread, and then – in a moment that showed my true shameful character – I put the 53 cent burgers in the middle of the pile so maybe the cashier would not notice.   

The cashier didn’t even look.  At me, the food, or anything.  Just swiped all the items and put them in the bag.

Ok, so now I am on the other side of having gotten away with it, and I am walking away, and suddenly that bloody thing that is always looking over my shoulder, my karma, starts poking me in the neck.   Its telling me that something negative is going to happen to me now to offset my shameful act.  Maybe I am going to get hit by a bus.   Maybe trip and break an ankle.   The burgers are vibrating in the bag.   Jeez I shouldn’t have done this.   I might go on a bike ride tomorrow and get hit by a car.  The karma keeps poking.  Poke poke poke.   Goddamn.

When I get home, I have to fix a hanging light that I broke the day before while trying to hang too many laundry items on the ad hoc line I put up in the back yard.    So to fix this thing I have to get up on a stool, and already it is wobbly.    I am certain I am going to fall.    No cheap burgers for you! the burgers are laughing me while sitting on the counter.   I should just throw them away, and be done with it.   I fix the light and I don’t fall off the stool.  Ok, so that isn’t going to be it.  It will be something else.  But but now I am beside myself, and realize there is no more living with those taunting bloody burgers.   I decide I have to return them just to get this panting gargoyle off of my neck.

After struggling a bit to find the receipt in the trash, I get the errant burgers back in the blue supermarket bag and walk back down the hill to the supermarket.   But I am still trying to be too clever.  Maybe they will let me keep them, I think, just for being honest.  Stop it.       

I get to the supermarket, and stand in line, and think which of the 3 cashiers will let me keep them?  Please, just Stop it.  When my turn comes up I get a lady and I show her the burgers and explain to her what happened, and that my stupid karma was not leaving me alone about it.    She hesitates and says, maybe I can get the manager to decide what to do, but then I quickly jump in and say “or you could just say that it was the machine’s mistake and I should keep them”,  so she replies, “yea, that’s probably what I was going to say”.    As if I was hypnotizing her, which I swear I wasn’t.

So I went home and cooked the burgers.   I was feeling ok.  Not entirely morally clean, but not afraid of being sent to hell either.   The moral of this story that I am taking away from this series of events is that – while I demonstrated honesty – it was only because of my ever vigilant poking karma that follows me around like a shadow.  But it also demonstrated that I am not above talking my way into things that maybe just might edge slightly over the moral line a bit.   Not enough.  Just enough to make me realize that I am no angel.  Not morally suspect. Instead Morally Eh, so to speak.    Good enough to get to sleep at night, with only the occasional anxiety dream.  Like anyone else, a sinner ever stumbling along the path to redemption.   

I guess I have to be ok with that.