Jake Carlson was sure that his life was stuck in a rut and had little chance of improving any time soon. It seemed that no matter how hard he tried or didn’t try, nothing seemed to work out quite right. It was going on seven months now without a job for Jake and his unemployment was about to run out on him- just like his luck had seemed to. To say that Jake was seeing the glass half empty was putting it mildly. Why, to Jake, his glass seemed to be nearly empty.



There wasn’t even a tiny microscopic thought of promotional pens that Jake had around noon that November day. All he could think of was where he would be living once he couldn’t come up with the rent for his one room flat near the railroad tracks at the edge of town. It seemed like Jake was consumed these day with negative thoughts and these just seemed to keep building on each other. So what does a pen have to do with this? Jake’s luck was just about to change incredibly and it was all due to some promotional pens that he had found on the street corner earlier that week and had absentmindedly stuck in his jacket pocket and promptly forgot about it.

Jake’s small New England town was built on the railroad system. The founding owner of this particular railroad was from this town and his descendents still called it home. The Hayes Line, as this system was called, was home town proud and had always tried to give back to the community. The great grandson of founder Timothy Hayes, Morton Hayes, was in charge of the company now and had the railroad company going strong. Morton was known for supporting his employees in generous ways including wages, benefits and bonuses. Jake Carlson used to work for the Hayes Line, but in a misunderstanding, was let go one day because of a mistake that seemed to be costing him dearly now.

When Jake got home that day, there was a letter waiting for him from the railway. The letter stated that the mistake of Jake’s firing had been discovered and he was being offered his old job back. In fact, Morton Hayes wanted to meet with him personally the next morning. Hardly believing his luck, Jake waited anxiously for the morning to come.

When he got to Morton Hayes office, all the past was worked out and Jake was reinstated to his old job. Elated he thanked Mr. Hayes and was invited to the company’s 150 Year Celebration that night. Jake went and during the evening there was a drawing. When a number was announce, Jake saw everyone looking at a pen. He looked around and saw it was the same type as he had picked up from the street corner earlier in the week. He pulled his from his pocket and saw to his amazement that it was a Hayes Rail Way Line promotional pen with a number on it. It was the same number that was being read over the loud speaker now!

Jake brought the pen up to the front and when they verified it was the winning pen, hundreds of balloons and confetti rained down from the ceiling. Celebratory music played and Jake was confused. What in the world had he won? It seemed that this was another one of the ways that Morton Hayes was giving back to the community that made his company successful. The prize was $50,000! Jake nearly fainted! All because he had picked up a promotional pen from the street! Jake no longer saw himself as in an empty rut, but now was viewing the glass of life as half full, if not brimming over.