Lost… and (Sometimes) Found

“Have you looked in your purse?  That’s the first place I’d look,” opines my spouse, watching from the doorway as I rifle through desk, drawers and shelves in a vain attempt to unearth the tickets. Not any tickets mind, but tickets to an event that is going to happen today!

These seemingly innocent objects are the last to fall victim to misplaced items syndrome—the law that says things which are so-carefully put away in ‘a safe place’ will never again see the light of day or the stars of night.

Yes, I have looked in my purse. I have looked in five purses. I have scoured the usual place where tickets are kept as well as my messy bookshelves, desk drawers, and even—in desperation—the refrigerator. Zip. Nada.

Losing things is not a new phenomenon for me. Along with my temper, my directions, and (occasionally) my sense of humor, I have mislaid umbrellas, books, letters, bills, and—of course—eye glasses. These last I buy by the dozen, but quantity, alas, never seems to help. I have also on a few hyperventilating occasions forgotten where I stored pieces of jewelry. No—this is no chuckling matter, dear friends. Imagine coming home from a trip and trying to remember in which safe place you have stashed the brooch Mother gave you and that pearl necklace, never mind the car keys which were hidden along with the loot. And what about the time I lost a bridal quilt only to find it  years later when I was making that same young woman a baby quilt?

That there are many unfortunates like me in the world isn’t much of a consolation, but it appears that I belong to a club with a large membership. Friends sigh over items they have put in a safe place somewhere … or recount horror stories of having nearly lost diamond rings, keys, or their new shoes. The plague is international, too. While I was living in Japan, I remember that there was an announcement from Osaka station’s lost and found stating that along with the umbrellas, hats, briefcases and cell phones left behind in the subway that day, someone had forgotten an urn holding his grandmother’s ashes.

Now, really.

I sometimes believe that inanimate objects are carrying on a war of nerves against us. How many times have we looked for ‘lost’ items only to have them pop up in a place which we have already dissected a hundred times?  How else can one explain the passports which were seemingly lost during a bicycle trip in Tuscany? The subsequent frenzied trip to Rome, the rush to get temporary passports, and the race to the airport is a story to curdle the soul of any traveler, but even worse is the re-appearance of those supposedly lost passports at journey’s end!

Whether by accident or design, most lost items do appear eventually, though most of them never come to light  until months after they are of any use whatsoever. As for my tickets, I have given up. Enough, I tell myself, is enough….which is when I accidentally knock my purse onto the ground, scattering its contents everywhere. And there on the floor…

Tickets shouldn’t be able to wink, but right now I am sure the beastly things are doing just that.

Just a theory,

But do objects just disappear

For the fun of it?