Receipts.

Do you think I have OCD?

I don’t think I have OCD, but sometimes I wonder. I’m reading a book I bought this weekend at the Goodwill, and as I stopped reading to fuss over some soup, I used the receipt as a book marker. But it was folded wrong. I don’t have to go into details here, you know what a wrongly folded piece of paper looks like, I know what one looks like, and this one was wrong. I used it to mark my place twice, then had to stop and fold it neatly before I could read again. I did this even though once I finish typing this, I’m going to throw it away because I have a stack of bookmarks.

But I’m reminded of another receipt.

While I was waiting in line to pay for this very book, the woman ahead of me was using a self-checkout to pay for her things. Her daughter, who might have been two or three years old, waited silently. This tiny girl had a sweetly serious face with enormous sad eyes, full pouchy cheeks, a somber little mouth, and some snot dried under her button nose. She was a small thing, round of head, thin of neck, with that fine, soft sparse head of hair most often seen on a child that was born bald.

Her mom finished paying, then took the receipt, folded it in half, and handed it to this waiting toddler. She accepted it solemnly. Then she turned to me with it grasped in both hands. She wanted me to see that she had this important piece of paper. There was something ceremonious in her manner, as when a Japanese business partner presented his card to me with both hands and a small bow.

I said something like, “Wow, good job.” Her mother smiled, and off they went, the girl carefully holding the precious paper in both hands.

And now I’m off to select my bookmark, and stir the soup, and wait for my cousin, who will arrive after she gets a rental car and fights her way through Portland traffic.