Lost and Sometimes Found
In Richard Brautigan’s book, In Water Mellon Sugar, he wrote of The Forgotten Works, which was a place where all things that were ever lost or forgotten can be found.
I very rarely ever lose anything and when I do lose something I figure it was stolen. The only things I can think of that I no longer have are: a record by M. Frog LeBatt and an antique apple sauce jar that looks like an apple. I suspect a former sister-in law for taking the record, though she denied it and I suspect a former live-in girl friend for the apple sauce jar and she denied it. Both items had their proper places and they are no longer there.
Sometimes things are lost and found. Once my father returned from Europe and left his entire camera bag at JFK Air Port. He was heart sick, but I convinced him to go back and look for it. We drove the 50 miles, and sure enough it was right where he left it. Like that would ever happen these days. An unclaimed bag would now be detonated.
I recently wrote about replacing the floor boards in my horse trailer. One thing I didn’t do was bolt down the rubber stall mats. Stall mats keep horses from slipping on the wood. I figured they might slide around a bit, but I never suspected they might slide out from under the door. Normally the horses keep the mats in place, but oddly I was driving to Jewell this weekend with an empty trailer. When I arrived there I found that one 4’ X 6’ mat was missing. It dawned on me where I had noticed a thump when I was driving. I thought it was a block of wood falling over in my pick-up bed, but it had to be the stall mat slapping the road. It is a very similar sound.
All the way on my return trip I kept an eye out for the stall mat. They cost around $35 to replace, so I was hoping that no one would have stopped to pick it up, but someone out there saw this valuable item in the road and it was gone. It was the beginning of a bad day.
When I got home to unload the trailer, the back door smashed a large ceramic pot that we collect rain water in; a $40 error. Then I realized I miscounted the hay that I bought and I was one bale short.
I could see what direction the day was taking, so I unloaded everything and went in and took a nap just so I’d stop screwing up for a while.
posted by The Guy Who Writes This at 4:00 AM
5 Comments:
Back in 1968, my mom, 2 of my brothers, and I flew back to New Hampshire to finally meet my parents' families. I was 14. My parents came out here and settled after WWII and, due to 4 kids being born and limited finances, we never got back to NH before then. While there, a 4-generation series of photos were taken. Once home, my dad took them in to be developed. When he got them back and opened the envelope, lo and behold, there are 24 shots of someone's pet poodle! We were just heartsick, thinking our 'rare' family photos were gone forever. Luckily, the people who expected Fluffy's photos found ours instead, brought them back, and they and we were reunited with the photos we expected. Miracles do happen, eh?
I lost something too that I really loved, but never found it again. I think it needed to stay lost.
i lost my blue lighter today.
it didn't keep me from quitting though.
There are days I spend holding both butt cheeks in my hands in the vain hope I won't lose them either as everything else that day has evaded my grasp. I suspect that on those days I should stay in bed and hope to avert global catastrophe. For if one of those bad days were to spin out of control, life as we know it may cease to exist in the end.
Kris, I'm sure the other person didn't want to see family photos of a family they didn't know. I can't imagine anyone not returning the wrong photos at least to get their money back. But that has happened to me twice and I never did get my prints prints, so you are fortunate. You always had better chances if you used a local printer rather than a giant mail order outfit.
Anon, very poetically written.
g and what will it take for you to quit?
Darev, through inattention I've totally lost my as. One day I looked in a mirror and it was gone.
Guard yours as best as you can. You don't want to look like Monty Burnes.
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