Disappearing Objects

Do things disappear in your house? We used to have a pair of blue-handled scissors living in a kitchen drawer, for snipping chives and opening UPS boxes - until one day they disappeared. We're sure the child took them and lost them; tape and scissors are always vanishing under her watch. I once found a pair of scissors under her bed, along with some locks of hair. Her hair. That she'd been cutting herself. Under her bed. Anyway, periodically we ask her, whenever anything is missing, where are the blue-handled scissors? Those scissors will never be forgotten.

Sometime last summer, her iPod went to the land of the lost. It was one of those tiny Shuffles, tiny, and therefore easily misplaced. Now the refrain is

where are the blue-handled scissors and the iPod?

or,

where are your library books and the blue-handled scissors and the iPod?

or

where are your library books and (insert missing object) and the blue-handled scissors and the iPod?

The other day, it turned into summer and so I broke out a pair of shorts that I hadn't worn since last summer (or fall or whenever it was hot). I dropped my phone into one of the cargo pockets. (I love cargo pockets; I love not having to carry anything.) We went to some friends' house for dinner. At some point, I fished my phone out of the pocket, I know not why. To my surprise, there was a soft pillow-like object in the pocket. A small grey nylon padded case containing ... the iPod and its headphones.

Bad mommy.

It had certainly gone through the wash, but seems none-the-worse for that and a year in a pocket.

But the blue-handled scissors are still missing.