The Lost Key

      'So, how did you lose your keys, you muppet?'

I have a gift. I lose things right in front of me. Then I spend hours searching and, inevitably, find the lost item, patiently waiting right in front of me. I saw lost, but things are rarely really lost. I really mean misplaced. And, in fairness, I do know exactly where my keys are, I just can't reach them.

I arrived home from work just after 4am, desperate to catch a nap before my next shift. Approaching the door I fished in my bag and pulled out my keys. Plugging the first key into the secure entry door, I let myself into the building. Forgetting I would need them again, I stuffed the keys back into my bag. I called the lift. Waiting, it dawned on me that I would need the keys to open the flat door. The lift descended. Steel doors barged open.I opened my bag, stepped through the threshold, tugged on a cord, which pulled out said keys, and let them drop.

My mother later said that she was always aware the gap between the lift and the floor seemed rather wide.

The keys fell free, landing with a delicate clunk on the concrete floor. I stared incredulously at the two inch gap.

I took the lift downstairs into the basement. The gap stared back at me.

     'Shit'.

I may appear rather reckless, dumping everything in piles on the floor. But as they say, there is a method to the madness. When I'm looking for something, I usually know which pile it's buried under. Generally, I don't actually lose things. I strategically misplace them.

Before parting for the Transiberian trip, a close friend gave me a 'tiger eye' stone for protection. I don't think he believed in the eye as a source of power, but rather, what it represented instead. I kept the tiger eye in a zipped compartment of my bag for safe keeping. There it rested; until Niszney Novgorod. Chatting to a girl, I jokingly attributed our incredible luck to the tiger eye. I pulled the stone from my bag, mainly to dispel the rumours that I am a poacher.

     'I should put it away now, I'll probably lose it otherwise.' Famous words.

Two days later I had this uneasy feeling. Immediately I went to feel the zipped pocket. It was unzipped, and lacking in contents. Somehow, I just knew exactly where it would be. I emailed the girl I had been chatting to in Niszney Novgorod, 'RE: a small brown rock, tied to a piece of string'.

Some months passed. I moved myself to Paris. I had almost forgotten the rock, and luck had long forgotten me. Settling into Paris was hard work; between the joblessness, the apartment-less-ness, and the crazy millionaires (a mad story for another day) I was beginning to creep to a low I had never seen in Japan's cotton ball safety.

One red evening on Skype;

     'I think you got a letter.' my mother said. Already, I was pleased with the news, I love mail.

     'I thought it was for me at first, so I opened it...' Her voice trailed off as she left the room. My browser casually wandered over to Facebook. No notifications. Damn.

     'But it was sent from Austria,' she said. 'Is this yours?' She asked. I closed my browser and watched as she pulled from the jiffy bag a small brown rock, tied to a piece of string.

My luck didn't begin to improve. But even for the mere sentimental value, I was ecstatic to see the tiger eye again.

I wonder about signs, and the signified; whether events and symbols are supposed to guide us to decisions. I don't believe in God, but I believe in something. The universe perhaps. The tiger eye didn't protect me from harm; but I wonder if the suggestion of provision, of protection or luck, was itself enough to make me lucky and keep me safe.

I have not had a permanent address since leaving Japan at the end of July last year. I have learned to let home be wherever I lay my head. That is temporarily my familial home, but perhaps losing my keys is symbolic.

If a small brown rock tied to a piece of string can, I'm sure that I too, will always find my way back.