Have you ever lost something important? Something essential, in fact?
The Back Story from 2016
The photo of a pair of transitions eyeglasses attached to a scarlet lanyard is still posted on my Facebook page dated April 14, 2016. “Hubby makes a lanyard with a red cord for my glasses today. He is not just being kind. He simply doesn’t want to look for my glasses anymore!” We are both hopeful that the lanyard will be the cure for losing glasses.
Through the Looking-glass
Here’s how the glasses’ story subsequently unfolded: On Friday, April 29, 2016, I went to my power-pump class at the gym. Obviously, I wore glasses to drive there and back. I’m nearsighted and pose a threat on the highway without them. Why, without glasses I might cause an accident.
That evening, we saw a scary Netflix movie, a British gothic flick “The Making of a Lady.” I must have worn my glasses then. I don’t remember squinting or sitting up close cross-legged to see the screen. I also don’t remember whether my lanyard was around my neck or somewhere else at the time.
The next morning, I planned to drive to grandson Curtis’ soccer game at 8:30 a.m. At 8:10 I grabbed my keys and my glasses. My g – g – g l a s s e s. Where are they? Too embarrassed to ask Cliff for help right away, I scoured the usual places: My computer desk, my dresser, the coffee-table, the kitchen counter. I couldn’t even find my backup pair usually sitting snugly in the console by the driver’s seat.
I did call off the hunt on Sunday, yet kept an eye out. There is always a chance for a miracle. Maybe those two shiny lenses will spontaneously appear.
Follow-up: Six years later (2022)
For me, wearing my eyeglass lanyard is an off/on proposition. Sad to say, I get distracted and forget to don the red lanyard as part of my morning routine. However, one May morning I was wearing my latest glasses, an updated prescription but with similar frames. I am proud to say they were securely fastened on the tiny metal loop dangling from the red lanyard. But then they disappeared. Vanished! Spirited off into the Land of Lost Lenses!
My mind is clear in the morning. Usually. But the search is on.
Once again, a similar scenario unfolds: Check on the usual spots with the naked eye. Then retrace my steps with a flashlight, hoping desperately for a glassy gleam to reflect back to me. Ten minutes in, I reluctantly summon my sidekick for the hunt. Embarrassed again, of course. At long last, Cliff and I call off the search, and I dig out my spare, a backup pair, the ones with transition lenses but a weaker prescription. “They’ll have to do until I find my best pair.”
Then later, several days later in fact: “What’s this I see!? My husband had been rummaging around in our fridge’s freezer section to find his emergency stash of coffee, frozen in case he runs out of fresh. To unearth it, he has to move aside other products including a large pouch of tilapia fish. Not believing his eyes, he notices an odd object–-frosted lenses with two wine-colored arms barely visible.
Cliff brings them into the bedroom and presents them to me on an antique saucer. “This looks like something you have been looking for!” He had pulled out my super-cold glasses, frozen at zero degrees Fahrenheit. Yes, frozen, but intact.
I think of cliches: “Hidden in [not-so] plain sight.” or “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”
But what if the prevention—and the cure—cancel out each other? Then what?
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