Lost.

No, this isn't about the TV show. It's about why I haven't posted in a couple of weeks.

Lost-
as in my cell phone after a weekend trip. As my husband helped me look for it, I felt like such a flake. He always has a 'place' for his. I was sure I'd left it in my purse, so after a quick search, I dumped out the contents of my purse on the dining table and did a thorough one. No luck. I looked all over. I tried calling it, no dice. Then I had a flash of memory- I saw myself turning it off, and zipping it in a little pocket of my purse I never use to keep it safe. Bingo! Earlgirl is a flake no more! Until we went to the bank.
My sweet husband set up a bank account without me, which is a problem because I do the banking, and they kinda like you to be on the account if you use it. They're sticklers that way. We were walking into the bank and he asked me, "You're sure you have your ID with you, I think I saw your wallet on the table earlier."
I did a quick scan of my purse. It wasn't there. I searched the whole house for 2 days. No wallet. No license, no recommend, no $100 in babysitting vouchers for the gym I've been squirreling away to be used at some future point. No cards, no medical ID, which is a biggie. If you're already stressed, you know how much a lost wallet will compound the problem? Last night, the blessed wallet was found. Half the contents were in Hercules' golden treasure box in his closet. The other cards were under a pile of toys I'd searched through before. All clues implicate a certain 3 year old. It's a good thing he's cute, I tell you.
Now if I could only find my keys.

Lost-
a library book I'd been searching for and enlisted the help of our friendly neighborhood library. They checked their shelves, I paid some fines, but we still couldn't find it. It was due 30 days before when I finally found it wedged between a book shelf and the wall. I turned it in, and checked to see what my fine was. Surprise, surprise! I owed them $10, and they sent it to collections. Yeah, I know. I was freaking out. The library supervisor couldn't tell me if it was an internal collections thing or real-life-destroy-your-credit collections. I needed to call a certain gal to find that out. I left no less than 12 voice mails with no response. I tell you, they were getting pretty creative too. I was about to set my messages to show tunes and sing them, or Dr. Seuss language, and pretend I'm reading them a story. It turns out, they were all out of the office, but I'm sure they were entertained by my messages. No damage to my credit either, I had 120 days to settle my fine before it did. It's a good thing too, because I was about to go "Library" on them, which is the same thing as "Postal", but quieter.

Lost- my dignity.
Have you ever been one of many guests in a home, and you have to use the bathroom, and there's this huge one inch space between the door and the acoustic-friendly tile? And it's one of those new toilet that can hardly handle any toilet paper and so you accidentally use too much because you live in a home where 'power flush' toilets are a necessity? And you plug the toilet, and you try to plunge it quietly while you can still hear conversation on the other side of the door? You're barely breathing because somehow you feel like that will lessen the "Blorp- Slosh" sound of the plunger that should be working, but it's not. Have you ever decided that letting the toilet paper dissolve on its own is a better plan than coming up to your host and whispering, "Um, I plugged your toilet. Sorry."? Me neither.

Lost- my sanity.
Have you ever obsessed about a parenting issue to such an extent that it grows and grows until it's all you can see? It's no fun, but it's easy to do. It's easy to think that by worrying, you can take the problem on yourself and solve it just by the sheer weight of how much you care. You can't, at least I can't. I realized last night that it's not that bad, and I'm already doing everything I can to help the situation. Worrying doesn't actually count as helping either. With that slap upside the head, I'm seeing the situation more clearly and I realized that it wasn't the huge, hairy deal it had become in my mind. Hooray! Sanity found.

So here's the scorecard:
Found:
Sanity
Wallet
Library book

Still Lost:
Dignity
Keys (I'll keep you posted)
Not bad for a couple of week's work, eh?