It’s been a crappy day at work for reasons with which I won’t bore you. But at about 4:00 PM I knew I had to get out and do something for myself. I decided fresh air and comfort food would solve all my ills and a walk (fresh air) to Greenlife for a cookie and then to the gas station market for a Diet Mountain Dew (comfort food) would do just the trick.

I stuffed three $1 bills in my left jeans pocket and headed out. It’s a beautiful fall afternoon here in the NC mountains and already I was feeling better. Get to Greenlife and there are buskers out front. This in itself is not unusual, but mirabile dictu, the buskers are good. This is almost unheard of.

I'd give up a Diet Mountain Dew for these guys

Three guys playing Tin Pan Alley stuff on resonator guitar, fiddle, and (!) saw. Despite the saw, they’re still quite good.

I now have a difficult quandary. I can not not put a dollar in their guitar case. I can glide by a bad busker with the greatest of ease, but a good busker deserves payment. I can hear my mom’s words, “Their mommas had to pay for their music lessons…” But I have literally $3 in my pocket. After giving them a dollar, I will have enough for either a cookie or the nectar of the gods soda, but not both.

The fresh-baked cookie seems like the obvious choice.

I drop a dollar in their guitar case, cruise into Greenlife and get one of their amazing molasses/ginger cookies. I intend to take it home to enjoy it, rather than on the climb back to Montford Avenue and home. I put the cookie in my sweatshirt pocket and my hands in my jeans pockets – it’s chilly out now that the sun has dropped behind Mt. Pisgah.

My right hand doesn’t believe its fingers – there’s something in there.

A $1 bill, to be precise. Left over from, well, whenever. So with a big smile on my face, I walk over to the convenience market and got my Diet Mountain Dew. It tasted better than ever.