Lost and Found

When I was little, I lost a ball.  I had left it outside, in the middle of a field, and had woken up the next morning to find it gone.  I searched everywhere, but that ball was never found.  A simple, rubber ball with a pink and orange design on it.  While I had it, it wasn't my favorite toy, but, in losing it, it gained a kind of special significance.  It was one of the first things that happened that my parents couldn't fix.

The other day, I took the Little Badgers to Ikea for breakfast.  We were planning on meeting some friends and were running a little late.  While I was pulling the stroller out of the back of the van I felt something bump my leg.  But, of course, I ignored it in favor of calling out instructions about exiting the vehicle and moving to the sidewalk safely.  Turns out, that bump was Big Brother Badger's favorite Lightning McQueen ball.  Oblivious,  I guided the Little Badgers into the store while the ball rolled its lonely way in, I presume, the opposite direction.

I was standing in line with my three little ones when a lady tapped my shoulder.  She had two children of her own and had parked very close to me right about the same time I had been pulling Badgers out of the car.  She told me that she had seen the ball fall out, had retrieved it, and put it safely on a bench in front of my van.  I thanked her profusely, and, indeed, we found our ball right where she had said.  Big Brother Badger was a bit confused to find his ball outside of the car, but took it in stride.  Later that day, I was hit my memories of my lost ball, long ago.  That was something lost, and resulted in a significant childhood memory, even tears.  Big Brother Badger would have been heartbroken if his ball had gone missing.  Did we, with the help of a stranger, dodge a similarly significant moment in Big Brother's childhood?  

A rubber ball is nothing, really.  But the feeling of having something that was mine, as a child, disappear without explanation left a strong impression on me.  It left me with a feeling and a memory that's carried through decades.  One little incident that my parents really could do nothing about.  I worry constantly about screwing up as a parent, but I've always focused on the big things.  The memory of my lost ball in the context of the one lately found brought it home that might be the small, unpredictable things that really stick.  The things that I can't do anything about.