Lots of Nice People in Key West

By Joanne Celi

Every morning, as soon as I get up, I take my dog for a walk to the White Street Pier.  It’s as much of an exercise routine for me as it is for her.  It’s over 6,000 steps – a great start for my day.  I take with me a small, crossbody bag that holds my phone, tissues and poop bags.  

This past Wednesday morning was very windy.  By the time I got to Atlantic Boulevard with the ocean on my left, it was extremely windy.  I was wrapping up a phone call with my sister-in-law when she said “You’d better go.  It sounds really windy.  Be careful.”  I was a good couple of blocks away from the pier, my turn-around destination.  But I could barely walk into the wind.  I turned to go back and noticed the wind had turned my open bag upside down.  I wasn’t worried about what could have fallen out because I still had my phone in my hand.  If I lost a tissue or poop bag, c’est la vie.

It wasn’t until I got a few blocks on my way that I realized there was something more important in my bag this time.  On Sunday, I put a credit card in there because I wanted to buy some baby clothes at the Higgs Market for an upcoming baby shower.  That card was no longer in my purse.  Since my memory isn’t what it used to be, I figured the card may be home – I could have already taken it back out.

So I get home and there’s no card to be found.  I go online to cancel the card and order a replacement.  But for some reason, there’s an option to temporarily freeze the card and I choose to do that.

I’ve lost credit cards before.  Not a huge deal.  So I go about my business and forget about the card, feeling confident no one can charge on it while it’s frozen.

Late afternoon, I take a look at my phone and find 3 separate private messages on Facebook.  I normally wouldn’t open them, but they mentioned my credit card. There was a picture of my credit card, my name only, posted on a private Key West group. Three people searched for my name and posted messages to me about it being found, including the person who found it and dropped it at the bar at Salute.

As I’m pulling into Salute’s lot, I get a call from the man who runs my pool service company.  He says, “Hey, Joanne, I think you lost your credit card.  Kyle called me and told me it was posted on Facebook.”  The bartender at Salute had it locked up for safekeeping.  

Six separate people in Key West worked together to get me my credit card back.  Amazing small world!

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