Daymare

Talk about living through your worst nightmare—or one of the worst:

I was out for a 16 km run yesterday, it was my hill training, so I went to the farmland where I found my hills to run up and down. After 6 km of hills, I continued on my regular route. That’s when I happened to pat my shorts pockets where the house-key should have been. They were empty.

I can’t even begin to describe the sinking feeling in my stomach. Meg, who has another key, is half a planet away, in Hong Kong. The only other person who has the key to our house is Meg’s brother, who lives in New York. And there I was, in my shorts and t-shirt, sweaty and stinky, with no access to the house.

The pictures went through my mind of me knocking on the neighbor’s door and borrowing the drill to drill through the lock. While I thought those practical, dreadful thoughts, I retreated my steps, and after 2 km I saw my key laying in the middle of an intersection. I remembered running across that intersection in full sprint, catching the light. My sprinting must have bounced the key from the pocket.

Okay, I admit – the pockets have no zipper, but they are really deep. I had these shorts for more than 2 years, always kept the key in the pocket and never had anything fall out. But, lesson learned. From now on the key always goes into the pocket that can be closed. Phew.