Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Packing and Unpacking

We had a great, relaxing time out at the coast last weekend. But since we were traveling with Terese and Greg and their family, it also was quite entertaining. Like, when I wanted to get a great friend photo with Terese. This should have been a simple thing.


Aww. Just look at us: Standing shoulder to shoulder. Together. Looking ahead bravely at the future. (Cue sentimental chick flick soundtrack.)

But.


Greeeeeeeggggggggg!!

And.


Juuuuuuuliaaaaaaaa!!

We had a persistent issue with photo bombing. Tsk. Like my new hat? I think it's pretty spiff.

YOU can explain why there was a police officer involved in our last dinner together for the weekend, Missy Terese. I'd put up a picture, except that I couldn't crop out the officer's name and badge number. True story. Honest. Cross my heart and hope to die.

Overall, it was a fabulous mini vacation.






So things went right along brilliantly, until we began to pack up our things to return home.

Before we left for the coast, I slipped this necklace over my head while thinking how much each item on it meant to me: the diamond from our engagement ring, the crucifix purchased after haggling endlessly with a jeweler in Cabo San Lucas, and the medal discovered in a very old and wonderful  mission gift shop in San Francisco. I wear this thing almost every day and when I'm stressed my hands automatically move to hold each piece and I feel better.


I thought how precious it was to me, and how devastated I would be if I lost it, or it was stolen, and so I began to remove it. But.......I told myself that something like this was best worn and loved and used, not sitting around in a jewelry box, and I let it drop back into place around my neck.

Which meant that serious panic erupted when I couldn't locate it as I gathered my things to take them home.

Seriously.

I WAS devastated. We searched every square inch of the hotel room, our friends' hotel rooms, we checked at the hotel office to see if someone turned it in, we searched the restaurant where we had dinner the previous day. No luck.

But I determined that I wasn't going to have a total meltdown after such a wonderful weekend and began to remind myself of various perspectives on the situation:

  • That if I had to choose between the diamond that John gave me and JOHN, well......the choice would be obvious. Or: 
  • That it was a thing. Not a person. Or:
  • That if I had to lose something, I would rather it would be a piece of jewelry rather than something far more important to me such as my lung or heart or kidney function. 

Yeah, well. This only worked minimally. When we arrived home, we began to methodically go through every item in our luggage. My heart stopped when I took the last piece of clothing from my suitcase and There. It. Was. Just lying at the bottom.

I screeched and snatched the thing, kissed it, and put it on. I don't think I want to take it off for awhile. I'm thinking that this was actually a pretty good experience for me in that I had an opportunity to fine tune some of my values AND not actually lose my necklace.

Sigh. I love happy endings.

2 comments:

annie said...

Sometimes I pray to St. Anthony to help find lost items, or just lost patience, depending on the days. Glad you found your precious items.

Julia Oleinik said...

Annie -- Oh, yeah. St. Anthony is THE MAN.

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