terrypetersen

A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of. (Ogden Nash)

My husband decides to have a glass of wine with dinner on Thursday evening. “Dear, where’s the wine?”

“On the table in the back. Why?”

“I don’t see anything there.”

I sigh. A bottle of wine can’t hide on a small green table against a red brick wall. There are several other items next to it, but not many. Our kitchen isn’t much bigger than the average postage stamp, so our three-season room helps to contain the overflow. It’s getting cooler as autumn continues, and Jay likes a slight chill to his wine. The porch is the perfect storage place.

“It was there yesterday.” I step outside to look. Nothing—as in a clear surface. Okay, I understand someone snatching a bottle of wine from a pleasantly cooled three-season room. But two containers of diet juice and two jugs of distilled water? That turns an everyday burglar into a kleptomaniac. Could anyone really be hooked on Splenda?

We look in all the usual places, but the items are missing. They don’t warrant a report. But they do make us wonder what the heck happened. True, on Wednesday we had nine kids playing in our backyard. Our attention was taxed. And, we did forget to lock the door to the porch after they all went home. A thief, a very peculiar thief—it seems to be our only answer.

Fortunately, my husband likes a glass of wine, but doesn’t need one. He doesn’t lose perspective. It will go on our grocery list, but the question remains: Why and how did someone steal jugs of distilled water without being noticed?

It becomes one of the mysteries of life until the next day when my schedule lightens, temporarily. While the kids were running relays, climbing trees, and jumping into piles of leaves, they were also on the porch. Could I have, in a moment of auto-pilot action, moved the items into a cooler in the corner to get them out of the way. I don’t really remember doing it. It’s a vague shadow memory, lost between, “Hey, you two get out of that tree. The branches aren’t strong enough,” And “Don’t push your sister.” Anything is possible.

No moment felt complete. One of our young visitors insisted on running out into the street. He is about two-years-old. He also talked around a pacifier. I didn’t understand a word he said. Thank God I had Jay to help me. However, we really needed a team of angels and an entire daycare service on hand. Yes, frenzy had its moments.

I open our large blue cooler, used only in the summer. There, neatly waiting, are our missing items. The klepto, or the overworked grandmother, is . . . me. Maybe there are some angels on hand after all. At least one tapped me on the shoulder before I got too far with blame that wasn’t warranted.