The lost hat

I was talking to my daughter after supper tonight to wish her Happy Anniversary (14th). She had just returned from a medical conference in Chicago, thrilled that she neither had a cold or DVT.

"Have you called the airlines about dad's lost hat?" she asked. "No, but that would be a good idea. We're just sick that it's gone. It was the right size, color, warmth, and of course, was a souvenir of the trip."

She then went on to tell me that a colleague they'd met with had lost her cell phone on this last trip and had called the airlines, it had been turned in and was being mailed to her. She also told me that she always takes off the book cover of a new read and puts it in her bag, but had lost one a few months back. She is meticulous about her books (must be hard cover and never a library book). Even though she'd used that suitcase several times since losing the cover, it fell out of the bag in the hotel room. She thought she'd examined every square inch of it.

And a thought came to me. I'd taken my husband's word for it that he'd gone through the suitcases--every zippered pocket. This is a man who can't find the quart of milk in the refrigerator because I moved it 2 inches. So after we hung up, I went up to my closet and took out the suitcases and unzipped and went through them one by one. Nothing. As I put the last one away, I ran my hand through it one more time and felt something. The hat. It was folded up and in a side pocket.