I know about Thou Shalt Not Steal. Also those sticky ones that say betterest not diddle another’s husband, wife, partner or Latin ex-boyfriend who sells papayas on the corner. I know about all those.
However, that stealing Commandment has to be amended. Average Joes don’t actually rob jewels or heist wallets. Don’t mug passersby. We are not talking certified safe-crackers facing three to five.
We’re saying that Moses’ editor maybe could have rewritten that one a little. More like Thou Shalt Not pilfer nor remove surreptitiously nor light-fingeredly lift.
Law enforcement says all human beings have different distinct fingerprints. They do not say we all have Krazy Glue on them. Yeah . . . trust me . . .
Ever grab a newspaper and, lacking correct change when the seller’s busy and it’s raining and you’re late and the train’s leaving, just cop a copy without plopping down the required amount? No?? Never???
Never beat a turnstile? Or crashed a fist into a stubborn vending machine so extra candy bars plus a few quarters clink out?
Visit a Hamptons mansion with an indoor and outdoor pool, tennis court, in-house movie theater, spa, two Bentleys, three in help, 15 manicured acres and $39 million price tag. Your guest bathroom is loaded with amenities. All bearing hotel names. Hand lotion, mouthwash, sewing packet, soap, emory board. All packed in their carry-on after a weekend stay. Nobody puts an arm on towel robes. Savvy managers charge for them.
Shoeshine kits from the room? Shoe trees? Laundry bags? Postcards? Coffee packets? Sewing material?
One five-star Swiss establishment said replacing their desk pens runs $40,000 a year. I don’t know how. Those pens have no heft. They’re very light. They also write very light. And my living-room one was broken anyway. I felt really guilty pocketing it.
I have a successful friend. Big job. Big money. Always weaseling my DVDs. Not stealing them. No. Perish forbid. Weaseling them. Borrowing them. He has a cold. He’s stuck in the house. Etc., etc. Why he doesn’t ship his assistant out to buy these things, who knows? A guarantee to return them is open-ended. I’m still waiting to repossess Jimmy Stewart’s “It’s a Wonderful Life,” circa 1946. Returned fast was only John Travolta’s year 2000 “Battlefield Earth.”
Among us exist match freaks. They steal matches. They don’t smoke. Their crappy households don’t do scented candles. Nearest they’d come to rubbing sticks together to light a fire in the woods is watching those Capital One vikings. Ask: “What’s in your wallet?” They’ll answer: “Matches.” They display a collection from everywhere. From restaurants long closed or condemned. Why? What’s the need to hoard matches?
We are not talking stealing. We are talking permanently removing. Stuffing pocketsful of those sticky McDonald’s ketchup and mustard packets. Pink Sweet’N Low packets, which always tear open in your handbag. Sugar packets. Airline salt and pepperers. Can’t steal airplane food because they don’t give any.
My driver, Reggie, with me 35 years, restricts his light-fingered agility to paper napkins. But he’s picky. He only stocks up in Chinese takeout joints. He’ll order a broccoli and cashew plate for $5.50 then pile on $1,200 worth of crappy thin paper napkins. Thanks to him, two wonton joints went broke.
Private airplanes. Hopping a free ride, you don’t help yourself to their mints or chewing gum? In a VIP Yankee Stadium box, you don’t take home a bag of Twizzlers meant for a party of eight?
And there’s the environment. Even Godfearers shovel up what litters their environment. Work in an office? Pads, pencils, yellow pads, rubber bands, paper clips, note pads, felt pens, loose-leaf books, reinforcements miraculously disappear. Also stationery.
A beauty salon is a hairdresser’s candy store. Bobby pins, clips, nets, gels, shower caps, shampoos, sprays, tints, ponytail rubber bands.
Supermarket. Shopping bags. Don’t even discuss gnawing through an apple plucked off a shelf then neglecting to list it among your charges. We are not discussing hard-core stealing. We are into delicate fingering.
Listen, I well know nobody — but nobody — ever packs a dentist’s yellowed magazine in their handbag. Nobody snips an ad, picture or story out of the doctor’s office’s Saturday Evening Post. Nobody — but nobody — smashes a vending machine to loosen a stubborn candy bar, which slides out with unexpected never-to-be-returned quarters.
Go to a theater. Buy a Standing Room Only ticket. Scout around. At intermission wiggle into an empty orchestra seat down front.
Chiseling is not construed as stealing. Order a soda. Half is shaved ice. Three sips are left. Get smart. Order soda — no ice — then sweetly say, “It’s really warm. Sorry, but can you give me a glass of ice, please?”
Years back at my home I hosted a super-high-class party for the Philippine first lady. Her invited VIP list included a South American UN ambassador. Mid-evening, around 8:30 p.m., his pocket rang. I was standing alongside. He couldn’t stop the ringing. Eventually he removed from his jacket pocket my small ice cube-sized bedside jeweled Cartier alarm clock.
Embarrassed, not knowing what to say, he mumbled: “Oh, I’d just picked this up to show my wife.”