Here is a happy story about a missing wallet from some part-time Steamboat Springs residents. Two women working in Steamboat Springs from the Navajo Nation in Arizona found it and saved the day. Here’s what happened, according to Eric Jacobson who reached out to us with the details.

 

My wife, Ann, and I are part-year residents of Steamboat Springs as we travel back and forth from the Dallas area every three months.

I lost my wallet last Monday with a fair amount of cash in it and, of course, a Texas driver’s license, four credit card, insurance cards, ATM card, HSA card, my life was in there. And stupidly, I had nothing in there that identified me with the home I have here in Steamboat Springs.

The process of securing a new Texas driver’s license, closing all the credit cards, etc. was a nightmare that I had already started, putting holds on the credit cards as I searched.

After 24 hours of going to everywhere I had been in the prior 24 hours such as the Anchor Way Church, Old Town Hot Springs Gym,  Ace Hardware, and the likes, I had given up hope of finding it. I had notified the Steamboat Police of the loss as well.

On Tuesday, it hit me that maybe I had placed my wallet on top of my SUV as I unpacked a bunch of boxes that were in it before I left to the gym on Monday morning so I figured if that was the case, it would have fallen off likely on Eagle Ridge Dr., a street with curves just off my Evergreen Lane. So I went out and put a sign on the side of Eagle Ridge Dr. stating that I might have lost my wallet there.

Not five minutes after I put the sign down, two construction contract workers who were sisters from the Navajo Nation in Arizona working as traffic control flag ladies on Storm Meadows Drive, pulled up to me and returned my wallet to me. The prior morning, they had seen my wallet in the center of the road, picked it up, and were trying to figure out how to get it to me with no phone number in it and only a Texas address on my driver’s license.  They thought they were going to mail it to me with all the cash in it.

They pulled up beside me as I was walking from my sign and handed me my wallet and would take no financial reward for it.

So, my wife and I invited them over for dinner last night and we simply sat and got to know each other very well.  We shared pictures of our children and grandchildren, and they shared pictures of their children.

We learned about their difficult life of being raised in a tiny house with six kids and grandparents,  with 11 people in it, that had no electricity or running water.

I could share more but we ended up becoming good friends.

They have had left their families back on the reservation where there are all but no jobs and such poverty, and are away from them for several weeks at a time, even months, on contracts, and they are literally so appreciative to have these six-and seven-day a week jobs here in Steamboat Springs.

We picked them up to go to church with us Sunday morning where our pastor at Anchor Way allowed me to share the story of their kindness before the service. Afterwards, there was a church barbeque, and they were quite the honored guests.

We went to Fish Creek Falls with them Sunday afternoon and did a hike with them.  A special relationship has formed.

The Steamboat Police Department called me Sunday to check in on my lost wallet and I told them the story of the wallet recovery, and of these special ladies, and they gave me your information and said this seemed like the good news people needed to hear more of these days. The ladies are Laurel and Dale Ashley.

 

Eric Jacobson on Evergreen Lane

Steamboat Springs