Tender mercies, lost keys edition

Several weeks ago I lost my keys. As in, I was ready to go through the stinky garbage outside, risking half-mouse bodies and putrid mummifying diapers to find them.

Tom looked, I looked.

I offered a dollar, then five, to any kid who found them.

Three days later they were neither here nor there, and I was bone-tired of opening the car manually, having only one clicker-fob, attached to the keys which were missing. #firstworldproblems

Tom asked if I had prayed about it.

Oh, I did not want to pray about it. You pray about it. God’s not going to answer my prayer, the mood I am in. Swear word, swear word, swear word. Where are my ever-lovin-mother-effin keys, I know one of those kids flushed them down the toilet.

Finally, in bad temper of the foulest sort, I knelt on my side of the bed while Tom put away his laundry or fiddled with something on the other side of our room. It was the perfunctoriest of prayers ever. But maybe a kernel of sincerity?

Please bless my keys, where are they, if you could just?

I got up from my knees, not waiting to hear or to listen, moving on to the next thing, which was the laundry basket I really should take up to the girls’ room. A clank in the side of the basket snugged on my hip.

My keys.

Amen.