There
are certain items that I think we all recognize we are, at some
point, going to misplace. Cell phones, television remotes, eyeglasses
and car keys rank high on the list.
Misplace
is a great word in that last paragraph. Even though we’ve lost
these items, and mutter our frustrations as we search, eventually
we’re going to find them. During the search itself, we know we’re
going to find them at some point, though the timing and process
might be annoying. The remote got brought into a different room.
The car keys were tossed on a desk instead of the counter.
Mutter
is a great word in that last paragraph, because we’re trying to
make sense out it. We carry our cell phone everywhere, so the
search becomes a combination of not just figuring out where we
put it but basing that search on where we’ve been. Change the
item from a cell phone to anything else, adjust slightly as needed,
then think about with the same approach. We swear, we curse, we
consider our options, and a stream of consciousness discussion
rumbles like a cloud around us as we move from place to place
lifting seat cushions.
The
biggest topic tends to be that whatever item we don’t have isn’t
where we usually find it. Remote? Should be on the end table nearest
the chair of the person that used it last. Glasses? Nightstand,
next to the book we were reading. Half and half? Kitchen cabinet
where we keep the coffee mugs, since we put it there instead of
back in the fridge.
(Don’t
use it. Friendly, kindly offered, pro tip. Get rid of that half
and half. You put it in the cupboard yesterday morning and it’s
been out for easily over twenty-four-hours now.)
The
missing items are a sign that we broke our routine. Not a good
routine or a bad routine. Just a plain, ordinary, bland routine.
I
have a friend with a drawer in their kitchen. That drawer is designated
for all things car related. Keys. Sunglasses. Spare adhesive strips
for the toll transponder. We all know it’s a hell of a lot easier
to keep those strips in a place where you can retrieve them right
away. Bad enough the thing fell off the windshield and you need
to remount it, the process of doing so doesn’t need to become
an all-day project because you have to search the entire house
when you can’t remember the place where you put the envelope with
the strips that you swore you would never forget.
I
have been looking for a measuring cup for six months. The three-quarter
cup measuring cup of the set. It’s gone. And, fair to say, after
six months it’s not missing. We’ve transitioned to lost.
The
biggest headscratcher of this whole difficulty is none of it makes
sense. You use the measuring cup, then move it someplace—likely
near or in the sink—to be washed. It gets washed, and dried, and
you grab it from the dish rack to put it away. Simple process.
Pretty straightforward.
The
measuring cup is not in the living room with the remote. I didn’t
put in the hallway closet with the sheets after finishing the
laundry. It’s not under the armrest in the car. First, it shouldn’t
be in any of those places. Can’t think of any reason it would
ever have left the kitchen. And second, I was ticked off one afternoon
enough to look. Looked everywhere I could think of. (Yes. Even
under the armrest.)
Where
does a measuring cup go? You don’t bring it to another room, like
the remote when you get up for a snack. It doesn’t leave the house,
like the phone when you head out to do some errands. It’s a measuring
cup. Unless you’ve got some strange use for it out in the garden
while planting seeds, it’s in the vicinity of the kitchen and
stays in the vicinity of the kitchen.
Just
shy of two years ago, I lost some shoes. Some boots and some slippers.
No clue where they are. But there’s a bit of calmness in the situation,
even today, since I know they could be literally anyplace. Over
the years I’ve left the boots in the garage when they were exceptionally
dirty, packed them to bring along on trips, and in general could
find them in multiple houses around the northeast United States.
I get how I could have lost the shoes. I’m also still willing
to think that I have only misplaced these shoes.
But
the measuring cup? How did I lose that?