Toddlers lose toys, children lose teeth. Pre-teens lose their manners and teenagers lose love. College students lose money, professionals lose sleep. Parents lose their patience and the elderly try not to lose their minds. Everyone loses their way here and there, and everyone will lose at least one sock in their life to the dryer.
Recently, I lost my keychain, and I was abruptly reminded of the turmoil that comes from losing something crucial in your life.
In that initial moment of realization that something is missing, it's very interesting how your mind plays tricks on you. I know I put my keys in my jacket pocket. So why aren't they there? Well, maybe you're only 97% sure. Maybe your missing item is in that special 3% that says no no, you only think you put that item there when in fact it's over here. So, you appease the 3% and try to calm yourself down and look in a different location. I looked in a multitude of different locations, but to no avail. When that place yields no results you move from frantic to crazy, trying to reclaim the piece of your life in disruption.
There are lyrics to Fastball's "Outta My Head" that go: "Was I outta my head, was I outta my mind, how could I have ever been so blind? I was looking for an indication, it was hard to find," and really, that's exactly how you feel when you are missing something. Well, once you've ripped apart your entire apartment/house/bag/car/whatever, or a combination of the aforementioned, and you resign to the fact that it's just gone, the crazy eventually passes and you begin to accept the truth. So there I was, having searched everywhere and tried everything but cut my jacket into pieces, feeling naked without my keys, wishing I had the chance to say goodbye; I missed them.
Fortunately, I have been taught that you have to find the window beyond the door, so I thought to myself, "always look on the bright side of life," and I couldn't help but to smile. I did have spare keys in my apartment so all I had to do was get in in the first place. At least I don't have a car, so it's not like I lost car keys. There was nothing on my keychain that said they belonged to me so no one in the city could come "find" me if they were that psycho. I mean really, in the scheme of things, ok, all I lost were my keys, on a pretty awesome bottle-opener-flip-flop-shaped keychain. Sad, but not the end of the world, I can get through this.
And then you really begin to believe that, as the aptly named song "Gotta Get Thru This" pumps you up in the background. You move on. You even almost forget that you ever had that item in the first place. It's replaced or better, upgraded; oh, you want to upgrade me? Thanks, Beyonce! Let's keep this momentum going, life is good now. And for most people who lose something, here's where the story ends.
But of course, my emotional saga was not over yet. You know when you're little and you can't find an article of clothing or a toy and you yell to your mom that it's missing? And then she yells back, "if I have to come up there and look for it..." and then it magically reappears? Let's keep that in mind as we continue, shall we? A few weeks later my mom was visiting me and when I took my jacket off to hand it to her, she grabbed it in such a way that she felt something funny. Yes, folks, that's right, my keys were in my jacket all along! BUT, to my credit, they were in my breast pocket where I never would have felt them or thought to check because I never put anything in that pocket. I was completely overwhelmed. I was happy, I was surprised, and I felt silly. I could only think of the lyrics "I'm a loser baby," because I was the loser of the item in the first place and I also totally failed at the whole situation. I was obviously not paying attention to the pocket I put my keys in when they went "missing."
But that's just one
interpretation of what happened. The more realistic scenario that I
think really happened (because I swear I put those keys in the right
pocket) was the ghosts. They borrowed my keys for a little and just
returned them to the wrong spot. Hey, "I ain't afraid of no ghosts."
So, moral of the story is: don't own jackets with multiple pockets, your mother will ALWAYS begrudgingly be right (even when she's not trying!), and when in doubt blame the ghosts. I hope you find whatever you may be looking for!
So, moral of the story is: don't own jackets with multiple pockets, your mother will ALWAYS begrudgingly be right (even when she's not trying!), and when in doubt blame the ghosts. I hope you find whatever you may be looking for!
No comments:
Post a Comment