On that beautiful, ordinary summer Saturday, my mom, my dad and I were finishing a much over due chore.

Aunt Dolly had passed on a few months prior. She had spent 99% of her life in her tiny second floor flat. Clean, tidy, sparsely furnished with her long time keepsakes, Dolly managed to live almost all her life independently and on a shoestring budget at best.

As her health became exponentially more challenging and when she needed round the clock care, my dad – Dolly’s relative, friend, care provider, and executor – made the difficult and tearful decision to move her to a very benevolent nearby facility. Dolly had no money. No savings. Nothing. Alone, poor, and in extremely poor health, she was in a bind. But with a determined search, my father found a wonderful place that welcomed Dolly. And knowing that she had no money whatsoever, their only request was that the little estate that she had be left to them.

One month into her stay there, she died peacefully.

That summer Saturday afternoon, we began the process of closing out Dolly’s residence. Our work was to bring belongings from the upstairs to the downstairs to prepare for a sale. With so few belongings, the time needed to finish the task was brief. No more than an hour later, all that was left to do was cleaning – making sure the space was as presentable as possible.

As I reached into the kitchen pantry to pull out a broom, I noticed an area we had forgotten to empty. Most shelves were bare, but the lower two plus the floor were lined with neatly stacked, old tin Folgers coffee cans.

Until I opened the first one, I was chucking over the sight. Can after can, row after row. Dolly must have loved her coffee because she was stocked up for the next century. Easily.

My laughter changed to overwhelming astonishment the moment I removed the first lid. I immediately shouted for my parents- the kind of shout that says come quick. I heard shoes moving up the staircase with great speed. To this day, I can still see my dad’s eyes as he turned the kitchen corner and saw me holding an open coffee can in one hand . . . and a fistful of one hundred dollar bills in the other.

Money.

My Aunt Dolly collected money.

In the pantry. In coffee cans. For a long time. Each and every can was filled to the brim with. . . money.

It was definitely a surprise and a tad bit scary. It was also comical as the three of us sat on the kitchen floor opening can after can and counting hundred after hundred. Who does this? But that moment, sitting on the floor, at dusk, thumbing through bills with my parents was not the memory maker.

Far from it.

It was the next moment when my dad happily joyfully and intentionally mentioned how glad he was going to be to turn all that money – that big giant stash of money we had just found – over to the nursing home that had cared for Dolly in her last month.

I am sure my astonished face said it all. I think I was a bit deflated at that moment. Well a lot deflated. For in my mind, I had already spent that fortune on a fleet of cars, or a European vacay for eight, or a mansion with countless space . . . the possibilities were endless.

But not so for my dad or my mom.

As background, my parents had spent a lifetime caring for Dolly. They were there whenever she needed them. Stopping their lives to help with hers. Doing the stuff people do for each other. They, however, did not consider their care taking to be out of the ordinary. Not for my parents. Helping Dolly was just a normal part of their regular lives.

At the time, my parents were on a tight budget with six children who were nowhere near self sufficient. I could just see the coffee can money making a real difference for us. Or so I thought.

But here was my dad happily and gratefully speaking about the number of others who might receive the same opportunity and the same end of life care because of Dolly and the coffee cans. My mom nodded her head in unison. With tears in their eyes, I could easily see that both of my parents were thrilled.

I know that Dick and Isabelle could have easily have pocketed that money. Those cans could have moved from Dolly’s pantry to theirs in a flash. Perhaps their tight budget would have been better.

But just for a bit.

I now know that in the end if they had kept the money, their hearts would have been heavy. That choice would have created more problems than it would have solved.

I often ponder about choices made in the world – those that are good and those that are nearly the opposite of good. My belief- that comes straight from my parents who modeled it not just this once but over and over and over for me – is that trying to follow a good path. . . trying to maintain high integrity, an honest heart, an ethical bar that cannot be compromised – in the end can really be the easiest and most fulfilling path to follow.

It can lead to a life richer than what can be found in coffee cans.