The “Lucky” Penny

There it sat. The small, dirty-brown penny, sprawled out across the small slits of the sewer escape. It was obvious to me and anybody else who cared to give a look that this penny had been through it all. However, its rounded edges still stuck true, smooth as always, unfazed by the world’s cruelty. It was just beyond my also dirty white shoes, merely an inch away from where I stood at the bus depot. Its cool head looked up at me, as if calling out to me… begging me to simply pick it up. The woman’s eyes struck deep within me, even through its grotesque and dirty visage. Why me? Was I the only one that this lone penny had cried out to? Or was I merely the only one who paid any attention, and took the time out of my hectic day. I could not be sure, and even to this day I am still unsure, but the one thing I do know – luck doesn’t mean as much to people as I thought.

Luck is a prominent part of everyday life, and seems to always be brought up in times of need. The wounded, ill, or dying constantly pray for some kind of luck to come their way; luck that will save them, and make all of their worries and troubles drift away. Would they then pick up that lucky penny if it slept in front of them? No longer would the lucky penny seem so foolish, and no longer would it be brushed aside as a “foolish superstition”. Whether it be a sports team crying out for that one lucky break that will win them the big game, or the same team who pushed aside a loss as “unlucky”, they should have all gone on that pre-game search, each looking for their own penny. I wonder sometimes to myself if the other team did in fact go and do that, and whether or not their search proved to be fruitful. Surely, that is the only explanation for it. Then there are students in school, who desire luck all the time. You can’t tell me that on that big multiple choice test, you didn’t just once take a wild guess, a twenty five percent chance to get it right. Isn’t that all guessing is anyways; simply luck and the yearning for one to have it? Maybe every kid should just keep a penny on the top right hand corner of their desk, letting its horrifyingly beautiful cover pounce on their errors, and give them that one lucky answer. Whether it is movies, video games, internet searching, music downloading, hair cuts, dentist appointments, or simply waiting for your bus, luck is the key to each and every one of them. Luck will craft them, luck will allow them to become something, and luck will allow everything to turn out as planned. “Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?” is maybe the only question everyone should ask themselves when they simply ignore and step past that penny which silently would give them all that they craved.

The lady at the bus depot, with her yellow horn-rimmed glasses, making her eyes bulge like full moons, simply stared towards me, and out the window, anticipating her bus; as did the short stocky man, his dark skin almost glowing under the dusky, overcast sky. Then there were the two smokers who stood outside, shivering as the beginnings of the night chill began to settle in. The drug-addict who could barely walk straight and the drunk who constantly shuffled around, asking the rest of the patrons for spare change both missed the penny. Did they not see the quiet penny, lying alone on the ground? Surely the drunk would have accepted its company, and under his breath whispered a small “hoorah” of success in his search. Even the two young girls (where were their parents anyways?) simply could not be bothered, as their make-up and Barbie’s took charge and control of their one-track minds. Oh yes, “the oddities of this place were endless” and the other people around me were no exception. There was the frantic woman, who was dwarfed by nearly everyone around her (except of course for the dark skinned man), who was panicking at not knowing her own bus route. She danced and stomped her foot in front of the schedules, looking confused and frightened all at the same time. It was obvious she was lost and the last thing that she needed was luck, or a lucky penny… right? Not even the Asian lady, her bright green jacket blazing off of the backdrop scenery behind her, noticed the miniscule piece of luck. Her St. Patrick’s day coat, which screamed “luck” was still not enough for even her to pay attention to lucky symbols around her, when surely, in her head, she was saying “I wish my bus were here… I wish it would show up soon.” Heck, St. Patrick’s Day was in less then two weeks, and not her emerald jacket, nor anybody around her, seemed to notice that the holiday which epitomizes luck was right around the corner. Were all of their minds clogged by the thoughts and desires of their own busses showing up? Maybe it was the low rumbling and humming of the two vending machines - one which sold salty chips and the other soda-pops, which only end up making you thirstier – that was disrupting their thought processes, and taking away from their acknowledgement of the lucky coin which lied mere feet away. In my mind, luck would have brought my bus faster. Luck would have allowed me to leave this god-awful place, where dirt huddled away in the corners, and the cold, smoky air leaked through the cracks in the shaky engineering. The penny threatened to fall into the sewer exit at any moment, yet still nobody paid heed, even when they were forced to step right over it to check the time on the payphone hinged against the wall. It would almost seem that the penny required the same luck in which it offered; the same luck that would save it from its imminent tumble.

My mother always used to tell me “A penny saved is a penny earned”, and I always took this to heart. Never have I tossed a penny down in disgust, just because of its simple worth amongst society. Never have I used it as a weapon to hit the nerdy kid in the front row, before slyly turning away, as if it weren’t me. Never have I played a simple coin game using a penny without calmly slipping the penny back into my pocket, to sit again amongst the larger change. I constantly knew it would feel out of place, but it always had meant something to me, forcing me to put it back in its least desired place. And there it would sit. Quietly, calmly, never speaking up about where it would rather be, or showing its jealously over how the more worthwhile change got first dibs on being used up. This penny, and for that matter all pennies, have accepted their place amongst the world as the lucky coin, the one that if you saw on the street corner and took the time to pick up, your day would be brightened in some way. The one that would bring you luck when you needed it the most. Was this simply a dirty trick used by society to deceive a penny into thinking it to be so? For that, you would have to ask the penny.

So I left it there... for someone else to have... for somebody else to have this same, exact moment. For another person, possibly just like me, or quite the opposite, one to just come up and think about this same penny as I just did. Another who will take it all in for everything it is worth; giving it the thought that it so very longs for. I just hope the penny can last that long, balancing on this insurmountable void between luck and falling.