11.10.2006 - 10:58 a.m.

It started when I packed to stay at my parents' for a week and for my subsequent honeymoon. I took my keys apart. I did not want to lose my collection of five office-related keys, so I separated their ring from my car key and door-beeper thingy.

So I drove north, got married, had a nice honeymoon with no stress in it. Then I came home. We'd forgotten to leave the big car at my parents', so we had to leave some luggage with them for the week. We packed my tiny little car with what we could and left. He drove. I forgot that my cellphone charger and hairbrush were in the green suitcase on my mother's guest bed. Signs two and three.

At home, I emptied the car while he made a run for desperately-needed cat litter. I asked him for my car keys before he left, but my hands were full of bags and I don't remember if he gave them to me. I didn't see them for days. Sign four.

I drove all week with my backup set, the one with the little metal charm with my wheel-lock code on it; the code I have written nowhere else and without which they can't replace my wheels, or brakes, or something. I forget. Insert foreshadowing here; I'm not counting signs anymore.

On Wednesday, I had to call my insurance to get a homeowner's policy set up before we close on that house on Monday; I did this in my car, pulling my wallet out of my purse and balancing it on the center console, because my cellphone was low and I had to use the car charger.

Thursday I had a 12-hour shift at work because I taught class, tutored in the evening, and had 324,783 students asking me for help in between. I did not eat for the entirety of the shift because I did not know what I'd done with my wallet. I came home laden with laptops and papers I need to grade but without m purse. I remembered then a funny purse moment--"Now where did I have that sensation of hanging it somewhere funny?" I asked myself, but could not answer.

Fine. I did find my wallet that night, on the floor by my bed, so there.

This morning I had to call the insurance people back and make my first payment on the homeowner's policy; I could do this because both my wallet and cellphone were in my house. My keys, however, were missing. My backups, I mean--not the original set I'd never found from Monday. I spent about forty minutes tearing apart my room, my pockets, counters, and the coffee table, carefully walking across the gravel in the driveway in case I'd lost it, and peering into the windows of my car.

When I felt that I was about ten seconds from throwing something, I did what I usually do in these situations...I called my mom. Talking to someone helps me not break things. We talked for forty more minutes while I cleaned out my car (turned out it wasn't locked), re-ransacked the house, and crawled around on my knees in the damp gravel of the driveway. Finally, I found a set--the original lost set. On his dresser under a pile of things I'm pretty sure came from his car. Mr. I-gave-them-to-you. Then on my way out the door, I noticed that the set of keys I'd been ignoring that whole time, thinking they were *his* spare set, were actually *my* spare set. Great. So I went to work.

But my adventure was not over. In the parking lot at work, I realized that I had not brought my coat, which contained my work keys. I knew this because I'd ransacked it earlier looking for the car keys. So I drove back home. Where, after getting out of the car, I realized that my pants were heavy because when I'd gone through my coat, I'd put my work keys in them. So, back to work. At about 85 mph.

At least by then, I knew my purse had reached the library's lost and found. I really, really need a vacation.

Again.

-stonebridge

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