Bronze baby shoes

When Larry was a baby, his parents had one of those portraits with the bronzed baby shoes made of him.  Since they were an Army family, they moved around a lot.  All over the world. When Larry's mama passed away in 2005, it finally came home with me.  It is my most precious possession.  More precious than my rarest piece of Pyrex, more precious than my wedding rings, even.  I'm serious about that picture!

So serious that before we moved, I specifically told Larry there were several things I was taking to the new house myself.  Tabbie Hoffman, Banjo, my Pyrex and that bronzed baby shoe picture of him.  When I went to pick up our boys at the condo last Wednesday, they were there, my boxes of Pyrex were there but that picture was not.  I shrugged, thought to myself that one of the guys packed it anyway and I didn't think much of it.

In the chaos that ensued last week with the moving and unpacking and cleaning (OMG the cleaning!), I didn't miss it.  I figured we'd get to it eventually.  As we unpacked box after box and got closer to having no more boxes to unpack, I started to feel a little panicky because we had not found the picture.  By Tuesday, I was in meltdown mode.  We looked everywhere.  In boxes we'd already emptied, in the attic thinking it was in with some Christmas stuff, in boxes of tools from the shop, in our suitcases, everywhere.  It was not here.  We could not imagine where it was.  Neither one of us remembered packing it.  Larry called the guys who helped us move and none of them even remembered seeing it.  I was devastated.  Squalled for three days.  Larry tried to console me, telling me it was just a THING and was not worth me getting so upset over.  I was so upset and stressed, I broke out in a rash all over my neck, chest and arms.  I could not be consoled, could not rest.  Crying all the time, I kept telling Larry, "That thing has moved 30 times and been FINE.  We move ONCE and we lose it!"  I was just heartbroken!  

Larry thought that maybe somehow the movers who moved the family out of here picked a box up by mistake, that maybe it was on its way to New Mexico and we'd have to just wait and see.  We knew that it was NOT at the condo because we'd gone over there last Thursday night to steam clean the carpets, mop and just give it a good deep clean before our tenants moved in.  Nothing was left in that condo!

Even though I only have a 10-minute commute to work every day, I use that time for quiet time with God.  That's when I pray about stuff and talk to Him about my day, my life, just whatever.  This morning, I told Him I couldn't figure it out.  I had no idea where that picture was but I knew that HE did.  I told him, "I know You're going to get it back to me." and that I trusted Him completely, in all things, even when I don't understand them.

I got to work, settled in at my desk and got ready for my meeting at 10:00.  

At 9:36, I got this picture texted to me from Larry with a message, "See the resemblance?".  He's standing just outside the front door of our condo.

I immediately started squalling uncontrollably, I called him and said, "Oh my God, where was it???!"  He'd gotten a text from our tenant saying he'd found a baby picture that we would probably want.  Probably?!  

So where was it, you ask??

In a kitchen cabinet.

Where I put it.

For safekeeping.

I remembered immediately.  We were packing my Pyrex that night and I said, "I'll save this for last, wrap it and place it on top so it'll be the first thing that we take out."  Sounded like a good plan, huh??  I put it in the cabinet to keep it safe, shut the door and promptly forgot ALLLLLL about it.  I'm blaming it on menopause brain.  That's my story...

I've never been happier to see anything IN MY LIFE.

 Do you blame me???