Quarter for your thought?

It sat there and sat there. I'm not sure how long exactly but it had been there in that same spot for at least two months. The corner of my living room, a quarter sat heads up on my pretty wood floor. Unusual? No, but the fact that everyday I carefully swept and mopped around the heads up quarter in the corner. It wasn't crammed in the corner but more perfectly centered between each wall. When I say I swept and mopped everyday I wasn't lying. After working my 8-5 job I would come home and almost as fast as I walked in the door I had the broom in my hand. Having a dog that sheds all day is somewhat an obsession of mine and I have an un-natural urge to keep my floor hairless....which to all my efforts...never works. So? It sat. Never once did I reach for it...as tight as money is for me and my struggle to pay my everyday debts, it sat. I thought about it at least once a day. Thought about why I wouldn't pick it up. It couldn't be that I'm lazy, not with the floor cleaning every damn day. Am I that spoiled to think a quarter makes no difference? Regardless of the reason it all came to a bitter end this past Sunday as my mother and father stopped in to say hello, he met me in the hallway with his hand laying flat out with my quarter in his palm. As he offered it to me with his explanation of finding it, I felt a strange, sad sensation rush through me as I smiled out of habit and thanked him.