Change Bowl
by Katherine Coplen

I used to sort change with my grandma, with a little clear plastic coin sorter. It was fun — was it? It was a kid’s idea of fun. Soothing, repetitive, shiny. Plus, I was hanging out with my grandma, who is the all-around greatest and usually feeds me cookies.
Now? Not so fun. But something has to be done because I’ve been throwing change in a bowl for months. And there it sits, mocking me. “I’m full of money!” laughs the bowl. “You could use me to buy tacos!”
Where does it come from? Y’know, the usual places. From the bottom of my purse. In the couch cushions. Sometimes, bizarrely, it’s in my shower drain (does that mean it’s stuck in my hair?). My boyfriend litters change wherever he goes, inexplicably. I scoop it all up, throw it in the bowl and there it sits.
At least, until today, when I decided to convert that money into more money — cash money I can use to buy clothes and pay for people’s drinks. Money I can’t use in parking meters. Money I needed to get out of my bowl so I could make a boozy punch in it or something.
So I quickly considered my options.
A 48-count bag of Coin-Tainer Coin Wrappers (“5 out of 5 stars!” writes the enthusiastic and lone online reviewer) is around $8. A mid-range coin sorter, by my brief Internet research, costs around $18. So, sorting at home requires a one-time cost of approximately $25 and some change (har, har), and then however many extra wrappers you happen to use during your coin wrapping adventures. Of course, most of that is a one-time cost, depending how hard you are on your coin sorter.
Or you can outsource the counting. Quick fact: CoinStar, the magic green coin sorting machine, subtracts 9.8 cents per dollar counted. It’s the easiest option, albeit the least financially sensible. But I had to go to the grocery store anyway, for coffee and other non-negotiable dry goods. Makes some sense, right?
Here’s my thought: I don’t know how many coins are in my giant white bowl. Pouring them into the CoinStar machine — so easy! So quick! Almost as soothing as sorting with my grandma! I don’t have to spend any time counting or scrounging for loose wrappers or digging through closets for a coin sorter I swear I had one time. It means I lose out on 10 percent of the money, but I didn’t know how much money was in there, so it still feels like winning.
There was $66.51 total in my bowl*; after the CoinStar convenience tax, that’s $59.99 in the form of a “cash voucher” that I brought to the cashier after some brief grocery shopping (sweet potatoes, peppers, onions, garlic, eggs, other various foodstuffs). I walked out with $36 and some change (har, har, take two) plus my groceries for the next few days.
Conclusion? I’m lazy. CoinStar is easy. And I had more and less money than I thought — more change than I mentally estimated, and, as always, a bill that went up more quickly than I expected at the register as my purchases were totaled.
And, when I got home, I threw the coins back in the bowl.
*And 4.20 lbs worth of British coins.
Katherine Coplen lives in Indianapolis.
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