A Close, um, Call....

Yesterday, in the interest of perhaps getting a little exercise, I decided to ride my bike along w/ DD to school, then scoot across the street to pick up the local greenway walking/bike path and make a big loop down the greenway to the next intersection, and back up the road to our street...probably a total of about 2 1/2 miles. DD was ecstatic to have company on her ride to school, and I stuffed my keys and my cell phone in the pockets of my shorts and we left.

My Sweet Baboo called just as we were crossing the street outside our subdivision; I rather awkwardly talked to him as I walked the bike across the intersection, answered his question and stuck the cell phone back in my pocket and finished out the ride.

Have I mentioned before that we live at the bottom of a mountain (or what passes for a mountain in this part of the country)? Upshot was I was really huffing and puffing by the time I got back home. I was embarrassed at how done in I was, actually, and I kinda staggered into the house and, despite knowing better, flopped down in front of a fan to recover. But I did get my wind back finally, got up and went about the day's business.

It wasn't until I needed to ask My Sweet Baboo a question about an errand I needed to run just before leaving to pick up DS at his bus stop that I discovered that I couldn't find my cell phone. Funny. I tried to remember what I'd done with it when I got home, but I couldn't remember what I'd done with anything at that moment. When I found my keys on the counter, without the phone, I started to worry. Picked up the house phone and dialed my cell phone's number...in the receiver, I heard my phone ring and roll over to voice mail. In the house I heard nothing. Uh-oh.

Just at that moment, DD arrived home on her bike; we decided we'd better go retrace my route from the morning. I went upstairs and told still-unemployed-oldest DD to go to the bus stop and get her brother while youngest DD and I got our bikes back out and began the hunt. We looked carefully along the route from the house to the main road, then hopped on the bikes and rode to the point at which I'd stuck the phone back in my pocket, got off, and began walking again. I really hoped to find the phone near that spot, but it wasn't there...so we slowly made our way, eyes downcast, back towards the school.

Flashback: in 2001, older DD's drama class was shooting a video for the Army Corps of Engineers about unexploded ordnance in decommissioned Army installations that are now open for recreational uses (I'm told that this is the video shown to anyone who is going to camp/hunt/etc on these properties). Both the younger Dkids and I were also involved, as they needed a wider range of ages than were in the drama class. In one scene, kids are playing frisbee in a meadow. After that scene was shot, several kids were selected to portray hunters and the crew headed over the hill to a wooded area to shoot that scene. At that moment, one of the kids noticed that his car keys...or, rather, his dad's car keys...had fallen through a hole in his pocket while they were shooting the frisbee scene. All the kids scattered, looking helter-skelter through the meadow of six-inch high mowed-but-not-raked grassy stubble. I watched the erratic search for a bit, then began walking, head down, towards the area where I'd seen that particular kid for a moment during the shooting. "Lord," I prayed, "The only way we're going to find these keys is if You show us where they are." Step by step, I walked a straight line for about 50 yards, then, without really knowing why, turned about 3/8 of a turn to my right and took about 3 steps. And saw keys right at my feet. The kids were just glad to get the keys back but I got all goose-bumpy. I knew it was a miracle.

So, back to 2007, I recollected finding those keys and started praying, 'Do it again, Lord!' I'd called the cell phone twice; both times it had rung then rolled over to the voice mail. So I knew it was still on (and not, say, ran over by a car). Since no one had answered it, I assumed it had not been picked up. But it could be anywhere.

DD asked me why we brought the bikes, since we were walking them while we looked along the sidewalk. "So we can ride them home after we find the phone," I replied, hoping we wouldn't push the bikes the whole 2 1/2 miles for nothing.

But, wouldn't you know, just in front of the school, where I'd gotten off the bike to wait for the clearance from the crossing guard to cross the street, I spotted a cell phone lying on the verge between the sidewalk and the street.

I had 3 missed calls; one from My Sweet Baboo at about 8:30 and the two I'd done trying to find the phone. It was no worse for having spent the day lying in the grass. Amazing that no one had picked it up...

We got on the bikes and breezed back home. Whew.

He did it again.