JULY 24, 2021 – We were running late as I strapped our granddaughter into the car. Then I noticed her ring was missing—again.
Earlier she’d arrived sporting a new ring—with “magical powers.” But being over-sized, it kept coming off. The ring was always immediately recovered by my wife, me, or the little girl herself.
Now again, under the pressure of our departure, the ring was gone. The princess couldn’t leave without it, upending plans for the hand-off to her father and a “beat-the-rush-hour-traffic” departure for the Red Cabin.
In such circumstances you need to step back to see what’s really happening. Yes—we had to call our son, delay our departure until we found the ring, and miss the full moonrise at the Red Cabin. Below the surface, however, I pondered how Illiana might perceive our reactions. I found myself aware of how aware she was. Before me were lessons in patience, problem solving, and rediscovery of childhood magic.
She watched as I walked slowly up and down the alley where the last positive sighting had occurred. I pretended I was aboard a plane scouring the ocean for a shipwreck survivor clinging to flotsam—a tiny object upon empty vastness. Bringing the plane down to 100 feet above the waves—walking in a radically stooped position—failed to reveal the ring.
“Let’s retrace your footsteps,” I said. “After turning off the alley, you went up the driveway, across the patio and through the back doorway. You immediately sat down on the kitchen step, where Grandma helped you remove your skates.”
“Uh-huh,” Illiana agreed.
“Then, remember? I pulled the Jasmine sticker off the bunch of bananas and gave it to you as you were standing in the doorway to the dining room.”
“Uh-huh.”
We searched the places I’d mentioned, but still, no ring.
“Think hard, Illiana,” I said. “Where did you go in the house I gave you the sticker?” I saw the wheels turning inside her head.
“I think I went to my play stove, and I think I checked my piggy bank by the side of the stove.”
“Excellent!” I said. “Let’s check.”
Still, no ring.
After the retrace effort, I switched from search and rescue to recovery mode. “‘It’ll turn up,’ as your great-grandma used to say when something was lost.’”
This didn’t work on Illiana any better than it’d worked on me when I was her age. “But we need to find it now,” she said.
“I know,” I said. “I’d like to find it now too, but sometimes we have to let Father Time help out.”
“Who’s Father Time?” she asked.
“A concept,” I said.
“What’s a concept?”
By now I was back outside. And it was time to buckle Illiana in and be on her way.
While my wife took charge of Illiana and the car seat, I made one more pass over the driveway. Seconds later I shouted, “I found it!”
“It truly is a magic ring!” said my wife.
What a concept.
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© 2021 by Eric Nilsson
