I’ve told my story based on this photo in many presentations, but as the years have passed, the story has changed. It’s become more—truthful.
I was six-years old. My mother, a 5.0 player, athletic and competitive—but not admittedly so—had a voracious tennis habit and had several regular weekly games. She loved it and she was good. One game took place at the courts at Los Lomas High School in Walnut Creek with a group that called themselves the Crazy-Eights. It being summertime, I was told I was going along for the ride. I didn’t protest. It never occurred to me to. That was just the way it was as a six-year old girl in my household.
Fortunately, a couple of the other ladies had brought their daughters. While our moms rallied in anticipation of their doubles match, we went off to explore in the wooded creek bed behind the school. In my imagination, I traveled far away. In the dappled shade of the trees, with the babble of the brook and our footsteps crunching on fallen leaves and branches, suburbia disappeared. We searched the “forest” for anything of interest. We saw scurrying squirrels and screeching jays and rocks to throw and sticks to break.
I don’t remember who saw them first. I’d like to think it was me.
“Look at this!” One of us yelled.
There on the bank of the creek was a scattered pile of paper of different colors.
“Bills!” we exclaimed. They were all of about the same small rectangular shape. We scooped them into our arms and ran back to our mothers to show them our discovery.
“Bills, Mommy, look at the bills!” I said, rushing onto the court. The ladies had just started their game, so showed only mild curiosity. My mother volunteered to take the “bills” home and examine them. We stuffed them all into her tennis bag, the women resumed their play, and we resumed ours.
That evening after my brother and I had gone to bed, my mother showed the booty in her tennis bag to my father. They were checks, all made out to Safeway or cash, totaling about $12,000.
The next morning, my dad phoned the local sheriff’s office. Sure enough. We learned that the manager of the Safeway store in Walnut Creek had been taking his usual afternoon walk to the bank with the day’s deposits (It was a more trusting world 50 years ago!), when he was robbed at gunpoint mid-way. My parents explained all this to me and added that a detective was coming to the house to ask us questions.
A real-life detective! At our house!
I was beside-myself excited. I found a magnifying glass and took two baseball hats, put one on backwards over the other forward-facing cap, and la voila! I was Linda Sherlock Holmes. (One of the hats kept falling off and I finally had to settle for one to create my “uniform.”)
Not only did I meet a tall, friendly detective with five o’clock shadow, the man asked my dad and me if he could accompany us back to the scene of the crime to have a look around.
Down in the creek bed, I scrambled ahead of the men, pointing to where we found the flung checks. Not far from that spot, my father spotted the missing piece of evidence that the detective needed, the manila envelope that had contained the checks. The thief must have discarded these worthless checks once he looked through the envelope. The detective was pleased, and several weeks later, the culprit was apprehended.
It was a great day!
The icing on the cake was when a local reporter and photographer arrived at the house to get the scoop and take my picture. I was featured as a “hero” in the local newspaper, “Honest Lindy” and the “Little Detective.” My dad gave me the credit for finding the manila folder (but I distinctly remember him finding it).
A week or so later, an executive from Safeway called the house. The company was so relieved to recover the checks and impressed with my six-year-old “detective work,” they wanted to present me with a reward.
On the way to one of my brother’s tennis tournaments—like my mom, he was obsessed with the sport and winning every tournament in California and Nevada in the USTA Under-ten division—we stopped into the Walnut Creek Safeway at the designated time.
Men in suits greeted us and on the floor of the store between the shelved goods and the check-out stands, they had a formal, photographed ceremony and presented me with 10 shares of Safeway stock. I didn’t know what that was but figured it was worth something.
Much better than some piece of paper, they wheeled out a brand new, bright yellow bicycle with shiny plastic tassels hanging from the handlebars, a banana seat and training wheels. Grinning ear-to-ear, I may have asked if I could ride it. It was a thrill riding down the aisles of the grocery store, almost running into an old lady in front of the orange bin in the produce section.
I used to tell this story as an “origin” story, one of my early inspirations for loving stories, mysteries, sleuthing, for being observant. And this is true. It was at six-years old that I first proclaimed I wanted to be a writer. It was a demonstration of my imagination and enthusiasm.
But as I encouraged other budding memoirists not to shy away from raw honesty, I began telling more of the story, the internal story, the tough stuff to share.
Though I loved that event in my life, for years afterwards, I felt not only the glee of the moment but also guilt and shame. I had been with two other little girls when we found the bills. I never mentioned them to the press. I never reached out to them to see if they wanted to participate in the glory. That was the guilt part. I don’t think I even really knew the other girls well. I don’t remember their names. We were thrown together by our mothers’ association, but still, wouldn’t trying to include them have been the “right” thing to do?
My shame was that I enjoyed that limelight. Very, very much. And I enjoyed not sharing it. In my household, I was lowest on the totem pole. I had no choice but to accompany my mother to all my brother’s tennis matches all over the Bay Area while he was in competition. While my mother kept a point-by-point record, her eyes fixed on his match, I was left to wander around with my Snoopy doll, my Noah’s ark full of plastic animals—acquired in pairs with every full tank of gas at Aarco—and my wildly active imagination. At a match in San Francisco, I wandered into adjacent Golden Gate Park on my own to find a miniature fairground, where Snoopy and I rode the swing ride. A six-year old girl.
By gender tradition, I was brought up subservient to the rest of my family and ashamed of my “big girl” body (more on that another time). I was “too big for my britches” if I expressed an opposing opinion or really any opinion at all. I was supposed to smile, be agreeable, be cheerful all the time, like everything my family liked, and do what I was told.
(Yeah, that f***ed me up for a while.)
Don’t get me wrong. My parents loved their daughter. I never wanted for any material thing or basic material needs. Ever! They just didn’t know. They presented me with a beautiful lifestyle, social graces and educational opportunities, for which I’m truly grateful.
But it has taken two decades of therapy to unwrap the shame and give it a name, and then let it go. And even now, with very little shame and regret left, I can still go to that default belief-system of my childhood very easily, the one I didn’t even know I had, of not being good enough, not pleasing enough, not being “right” somehow, of being bad for feeling anything but joy.
They say that “synapsis that fire together, wire together.” I’m still trying to change and re-circuit the electrical system within myself. It’s a mindful practice. Staying loving and caring of myself has to be a conscious act. Every day. But it’s one I’m hugely grateful for!
So, that is the full story of finding the checks in the woods. I am Honest Linda—as long as I’m honest with myself—I was inspired by that childhood episode. I LOVE making up stories, using my imagination, approaching life with wonder, being observant of the world around me, and sleuthing, researching for hidden facts and untold stories. And the guilt and shame, that was true too.
My only regret left is that, after the Safeway stock doubled while I was in college and, not knowing how to manage my money and badly in need of more, I sold it. I think I made a thousand bucks, maybe two, enough to buy a working used car. It would’ve been worth a lot more today! Oh well! Live and learn!