Thursday, November 29, 2012

LOST AND FOUND



Lost things aren't gone. You find yourself searching for that ribbon,  photo, letter, or memento that you put somewhere, but can't find anymore. You can't pick it up, but gee, it keeps itching in your mind.

Found things  --wow -- a wave of joy comes over you, like  balmy fresh air.

I had a towel -- green -- part of a set I bought for my bathroom about 12 years ago when I came back to NYC, temporarily, and then, decided I'd stay. I bought green things and redecorated my bathroom, my private room in which there are shelves and a cabinet. Things I use, or used to use, or want to use are assembled, and more or less maintained, often deliberately ignored, but that's also a way of maintaining them.

One green towel got a spot on it from iodine that spilled.   I couldn't use the towel.  I cut it in half. The cut edge was unraveled. I folded it, sewed a narrow hem, rolled the hem and made a French seam that I'd learned to do a million-trillion heart beats ago, when I was learning to make tailored shirts for my husband. Don't ask me why -- was it that gorgeous shirt from a show that someone had designed?  I wanted to make a shirt that style for my man.

So the folded half of the green towel became -- one day, when my studio floor needed to be cleaned -- the cloth I attached to the large broom's brush, a two-foot-long brush that's part of our heavy-duty broom, that we use to sweep the 25 X 45 ft. floor of my dance studio.  With it safety-pinned around the broom's brush, the dust, grit and some of last month's rosin (that I use so I won't slip) were easily picked up. 

Marta, who is a sister whom I pay to come in and clean things once-a-month, used it. She wet the towel, rung out the water, re-safety-pinned it, and damp-mopped.  Enough rosin remained!  She did it last month and this month!  It works!

We celebrated. Marta washed the towel. I put it away and ... well, I don't know where I stashed it. I've looked for it, keep re-tracing the thought I had when I took the damp, half-piece of green towl and hung it up some place, but I can find it.

Each time I see Marta, we say, "Where 's the towel?"

So lost things, are lost, but never do they really disappear from the important place in your mind where you put things that aren't solved, things that you privately, personally,  unimportantly, but importantly need to solve.

If I find the green towel, actually -- after a moment of joy,  that blessed balmy breeze -- well, it won't make much difference.  I'll just have room in my personal lost-and-found, for other, important lost things for me to think about, look for, and try and try, keep trying to find. 

8 comments:

Peggy Bechko said...

LOL - didn't you realize there's another dimension? Things pop in and out of it all the time, things like your towel, paperclips, books, pencils, keys - U name it. Must be cluttered over there (wherever there is) until the item pops back.

Carola said...

You'll find your green towel when you least expect it. I am always losing things in my house.

Anonymous said...

You will find that green towel eventually whenyou least expect it. When I was 17-19 yrs old I video taped my close group of girlfriends and I doing film skits and put it all to music. that was about 40 years ago and last yr one of my friends said, "Where is that video?" So I spent 6 months hunting for it and finally found it-the last item to come out of a shed when cleaning and sent it off and made a DVD of all us crazy girls acting silly and made copies for all to see. It was such a happy and fun moment to find and see this video! We all keep laughing at it....it took 6 months to find and search, but what a treasure I finally found. Good blog today Em! kam

RCToyPalace said...

LOL, Em, I can relate to your post. I am fortunate in that regard, mostly, as I don't have a lot. My struggle these days is going into a room for something, and not remembering what I was there for.

Gus said...

Yep. Woke up one morning and my wife was gone. Now I keep searching forever for her -- so that I know exactly where I can hide, so that she never finds me again; just in case she decides to come back. Ha ha!

Anonymous said...

Socks. They say the dryer eats them. I have a hamper full of unmatched socks.
Maybe there IS some graveyard for lost things in another dimension.
May they stay where they are with all the other lost toys, keys, socks and things that go bump in the night!
Louise Sorensen
louise3anne twitter

OR said...

A green towel, eh! It'll be in the nearest Irish Bar, with someone swearing it's the queerest Irish flag s/he ever did see -- what with that iodine spot an' all. :)!

Maureen Jacobs said...

I have a few things that have been with me for years. I understand that they carry more than just the intended usage with it. It has many stories. Even if you never find the green towel again, it is something that binds you to the times spent with it. It will never be LOST.