According to most folks you talk to these days, a penny just isn’t worth the copper that it’s coated with. Admit it. When you see one lying on the ground, you think that the calories that it would take to fetch that little piece of copper-coated zinc alloy just aren’t worth the value of the penny.

Think about it. I am willing to bet that most of us have walked right past one lying there in plain sight as if it were a cigarette butt. Pennies have lost their respect as a functional financial instrument of daily commerce. Everyone hates to get them in change. Heck, they have “give a penny/take a penny” dishes at nearly every convenience store! There have even been bills submitted to the Congress addressing the desire to get rid of the penny. The fact is it now costs more to make than the penny is actually worth. According to the US Mint, it now costs 1.5-1.7 cents to make one penny. That’s a losing proposition no matter how you slice it.

Folks, I’m not like everyone else. To me, a penny is priceless. Read on.

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure

I look at pennies on the ground in two ways. From a fiscal standpoint, a penny represents more than I make on a losing day on the stock market (unlike taking a profit on a stock, picking a penny off of the ground is a tax free event!). From a spiritual standpoint, I see pennies on the ground as personal reminder that my beautiful late wife, Monica, is watching over me and my boys.

People ask me quite often on my walks, “What are pennies from Heaven?” I cannot answer that question definitively for others. First, I tell tell them that it really holds a deeply personal meaning to me. Then I offer my own story.

When Monica and I started dating, when things got complex, there would be an occasional quiet moment in our conversation. You know the kind…when something truly emotionally-charged dominates you and/or your friend’s/spouse’s mind. I recall on several occasions, I would ask her “a penny for your thoughts.” She would look to me with those big beautiful eyes and say, “It’s OK.” With those two words, I was put at ease. I trusted her. Regardless of the issue at hand, I knew that she … we… would be OK.

Today, those words echo in my head every time I see a penny. To me, she is saying, “Dale, it’s going to be OK. Trust me. I love you.”

I will tell you here and now that I’ve found pennies in the strangest situations. The day that I picked up Monica’s cremains from the funeral home, I found a penny on the ground directly under the driver side door to my car. The day that we celebrated Monica’s life, I found another one facing up in the church parking lot. While most scientifically-minded folks out there will certainly be screaming “coincidence!”, it doesn’t really matter. Finding a penny is a trigger. My emotional response is instantaneous. I immediately think of her…her words… her smile. What I hold in my heart and mind is her memory and it puts me at ease. I know that I am not the first person to, uh excuse the pun, “coin” the term “Pennies from Heaven,” but I will tell you that finding a penny on the ground during a very challenging time in my life is very spiritually uplifting.

A close personal friend recently lost her daughter to MS. She shared with me her own version of “Pennies from Heaven.” To her, finding a penny was a spiritual reminder of her lovely daughter. Like me, it was a trigger to happier times.

Perhaps it is sheer coincidence that I find pennies seemingly everywhere, but don’t you find it odd that in any given parking lot, many the size of a football field, finding a penny lying on the ground within a ten foot radius of me is rather surreal? Go ahead, skeptics. Laugh on. There is one thing that you cannot take away from another person, regardless of the earthly concept of random events: that is a person’s faith.

Readers, in order to make the past sacred, we have to hold something dear. Me finding an old beat-up and neglected penny is my way of connecting to a beautiful and loving past. There is nothing superstitious or spooky about it. The penny is merely a reminder. A reminder of something wonderful. And as long as I have those little reminders, she will never be forgotten.

I started Monica Cooper’s Pennies from Heaven on the 2007 Charlotte Avon Walk for Breast Cancer (four months after Monica’s passing) as a way to thank all of the walkers for continuing the search for a cure. It was my personal way to add context to the walk. I figured that if I could get people to look for painted pennies all along the course, it would not only help to take their mind off of the blisters, aches and pains, but they would remind them that their loved ones were still in their minds and hearts. They were also intended to generate conversation - to get people to TALK about their individual circumstances with others.

As of the 2009 Washington DC Avon, I have distributed over 3000 pink ribbon painted pennies along the course of both the streets of Charlotte and Washington DC. The tradition will continue at this year’s Washington DC Avon Walk for Breast Cancer.

Keep your eyes open. You just may find one. Not only is Monica watching you, she is thanking you for everything that you have done so that others who follow in her footsteps see the end to this evil bastard demon disease we call breast cancer.

God Bless and thanks for reading.