A Small Miracle

This isn't exactly relevant to my blog, but Hashem did a great chesed for me this week and I would like to publicize His wondrous ways. B"H this was nothing earth-shattering, but it was still quite amazing. Here goes:

On Tuesday, we all planned a suprise goodbye party for Tehila (my sister, who is finishing seminary next week). We planned a scavenger hunt, where she would find us, ultimately ending up in a park near her dorm. (Things didn't work out exactly as planned, but that's another story).

Anyways, we got off the bus from Beitar and only one sister (we'll call her A) was in the area. We hadn't heard from B or C, so I figured I'd have enough time to run a quick errand. Then, I met up with A in the mall to pick out a present for Tehila. After we picked out a gift, A asked me to pay while she went to pick up ice cream. Just then, I noticed that my wallet was missing! Oy vey! Did someone pick it out of my diaper bag while I was distracted, looking at jewelry (why is my first thought always something sinister?!) or maybe it fell out of my bag while I was walking to the mall? I left the kids with A and retraced my steps back to the store where I went first, but no wallet in sight. I went into the store and asked if anyone found a wallet. They told me that a frum woman had just come in a few minutes ago, who found a wallet outside, but she didn't leave her information.

I breathed a sigh of relief- B"H at least someone frum had found it, and be"h I would get it back. But when? And how? No one remembered how the woman looked, and they didn't know her name or where she lived.

So I headed toward to Tehila's dorm (by now B and C arrived) and we had a great time, even though I was busy calling my answering machine the whole time to see if someone had called that they found my wallet- I was really hoping it would turn up before I went back to Beitar, because I didn't want to make another trip to pick it up.

But the time flew by and no phonecalls from my wallet's finder....so I decided it was time to head home. Of course it took forever to actually get out of the dorm (the kids all needed to use the bathroom), then one of the kids ran all the way down the street in the wrong direction, so it took a while to get going. I hung up a few signs about my wallet, and I was hoping that by doing this hishtadlus, I would get my wallet back.

I decided to stop in a bakery around the corner from the bus stop, to pick up something for the kids to eat for supper on the bus, since we'd get home so late. While I was there, I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask the cashier if anyone had come in with a lost wallet- this bakery was right in the area where I had lost it. The cashier pointed to someone else- at first I thought she hadn't heard me (she was listening to her MP3) but then she told me- that woman found a wallet!

I couldn't believe it! Sure enough, this woman had found my wallet- she had tried tracking me down but my number was not listed, and my insurance (she saw my card in the wallet) wouldn't give out my information- so she didn't know how to find me. She left the wallet by a friend of hers, who lives in the area, so I went to get it!

The whole thing was so amazing- imagine if I had gotten out of the dorm faster, or one of the kids hadn't run away, or if I hadn't stopped to hang up signs, or I hadn't walked into that bakery (there was another one on the way which I didn't go into)- I would have gotten there before the woman who found my wallet. Or if I hadn't asked the cashier. And that B"H the person who found my wallet was a frum, ehrlich person.

It struck me how Hashem orchestrates everything down to the second. He has a Master Plan which always works out as planned (unlike Minkus sister parties!) and even though we usually don't get to see the whole picture, its incidents like these which help remind us how wondrous He is.