Stranger s unselfish act does not go unnoticed
Staff reporter
It doesn't happen every day when a stranger goes out of his or her way to help another but it happened to Thelma (Loveless) Green of Whitewater.
Thelma and husband Robert visited Thelma's family's gravesite Memorial Day weekend, 2005, at Marion Cemetery.
"I can't remember for sure which day it was," said Thelma, "either Saturday or Sunday before Memorial Day."
The couple often visits Thelma's parents' and sister's gravesites, most particularly each Memorial Day weekend.
"As we began to leave, I noticed my watch was gone from my wrist," she said. "We looked and looked for it but we couldn't find it."
Finally the couple gave up, got in their car, and drove away.
"I went home and wrote it off," Thelma said, certain she would never see it again.
The watch was fairly new and cost around $100, which is a significant amount of money to Thelma, so she felt badly when it was lost.
She didn't think much about the lost timepiece until the couple returned May 28, of this year, to Marion Cemetery to pay their respects and decorate the family's gravesite.
"We drove up in the car and I said 'There's my watch!'" said Thelma. "I got out of the car, and there it was — setting on my baby sister's head stone. I was very surprised."
The watch that was lost a year earlier somehow was found by someone and kept from harm for a year.
That special someone then returned the watch near the place he or she probably found it, hoping the rightful owner would recover it.
"It hadn't been in the weather," Thelma said. "The watch had a little dirt on it but otherwise was in good condition," which leads any sleuth "wannabe" to deduce that the watch probably was found fairly soon after it was lost.
Regardless of how the watch traveled through time, the thankful Marion County native wants the Good Samaritan to know that he or she is appreciated. Thelma placed a classified ad in the Marion County Record to thank the stranger for their honesty or maybe even for a chance to meet.
Just in case she doesn't get an opportunity for that face-to-face thank you, Thelma has this message:
"Thanks a million. I sure appreciate it. Whoever you are, you did a good deed."
Only in Marion
