30th
Lost (and Found. Repeat)
I.
I almost lost the gallery’s sidewalk sandwich board.
I totally forgot to bring it in from the sidewalk last night. I locked up and walked right by it I guess. I continued to forget all night (where instead I was having nightmares that the ringworm had spread to my scalp and I was losing my hair), and up until this morning, when I basically sat up, remembered, and swore.
I came down early, and didn’t see it. My heart raced as I was trying to think about how to tell the boss, or how to replace it like a dead pet. Then, in the neighbors stairwell, I saw it! Yes! When I finally woke them up with repetative punching of the door buzzer, they said they found it down the street - DOWN THE STREET - and brought it home! Whew.
II.
I got a ride to work yesterday, because we were returning a rental car. When I got out of the car, I needed my key for the gallery, which was on the ring of the keys in the ignition. So we did a switch, until he realized his keys were not in his pocket, after frantically searching the car, not in the car either. Fearing they were in the cup holder of the Ford Focus we just dropped off, I left all the keys but the one I needed, and he drove back north to the rental lot. The car was already rented, and no keys were found. He didn’t get a receipt the first time, so he got a receipt. Then he drove home, deciding to check one more time for the keys under the driver seat.
Meanwhile I am at the gallery for about an hour before I get a call. “Hey, I found my keys, but I lost my wallet and the receipt.”
This conversation has happened before: Where is the car, where is my hat, where did I leave this? I did my usual: asking about specific locations, facilitating backtracking, asking about it’s last known whereabouts…we eliminated all possible locations, identified the fact that the wallet and receipt were last seen at the rental place, where he had just driven home from. So he went back down to the car to check.
It was on the roof of the car. THE ROOF! Open, and with the receipt still fluttering under the weight of the wallet. Presumably both had stayed on the roof for a mile drive back from the rental place without tumbling onto a busy city street to their demise. Oy vey.
These accounts represent only the last 24 hours of our lives.
Last night he let his last remaining favorite hat fall out of the booth of the bar, didn’t notice, I picked it up off the floor. All winter I’m chasing him around with the gloves he almost left on the train, on the table of a cafe, on the street. I can never find my glasses and only think of looking when my contacts are out and can’t see. I stumble around with my hands out, eyes squinting, lower my face within inches of every shiny surface that could be a lens. Almost every night he finds them for me. When I put them on they are crooked and one nosepad is actually scotch tape, because about two years ago I couldn’t find them after cleaning my room, sat on the bed to think about where they could be and heard a crunch. Because I had made my bed WITH THEM INSIDE. Yeah. We’re not old, and I’m pretty sure not senile. Can you imagine when we are?! Maybe we’ll get it together before then, but if not, watch out.
