All the Lost Things

Available for over a year

Good morning. I must confess mornings are a nightmare for me unless I pack my bag the night before. If I don’t, it’s game over. Rather than getting ready, if I haven’t packed everything, ready to go by the door, I will spend ages fixated on finding that missing lip-balm or looking for that one specific top because I absolutely hate the feeling of losing something and not being able to find it. It would be comical if I wasn’t late as often as I am. Maybe it’s because the things that really haunt me aren’t lost things but lost moments, missed opportunities, lost friendships over the years. And the thing is, I wouldn’t even begin to know how to find those, or even how to repair them, take better care of them and not lose them again. I heard this phrase “anticipatory grief will be the death of me,” and I thought same girl same. I spend so much time bracing for loss — especially the thought of losing my parents or loved ones hoping that if I think about it enough it won’t shock me or hurt me as much as I am afraid it will. Once when I couldn’t find my phone in my bag (it was in my jacket pocket), my friend said since I was a Christian I should ask Saint Anthony to sort it out and help me find my phone. Although I am not Catholic, in the face of all the lost things, past present and future; I have found myself thinking a lot about that moment and my friend and Saint Anthony. So if you still can’t find your car keys this morning you now know which saint to have a little word with. Anyway, Heavenly father, may all the lost things find their way back to me, all the love all the time all the moments that seem so heart achingly gone and irredeemable. Father God surprise me with gladness in the unfamiliar desert of grief over something lost. Amen