Hide and Seek

Today we found our “Grateful Pumpkin.” You might ask, “what is a Grateful Pumpkin?” It was supposed to be a wonderful new Thanksgiving tradition to bring reflection and focus to our holiday. (These activities are usually doomed to failure from conception, so I shouldn't be surprised at the epic failure this yielded.)

In my passion as an amateur decorator, I subscribe to Better Homes and Gardens (I call it Better Homes Than Mine). Usually they have ideas that would require a second mortgage on the house or selling a bodily organ, so I read and drool covetously with no intention of recreating. Until October... the little ceramic turkey had a beautifully written tag with a declaration of gratitude. The idea of the the exercise was then to hide the turkey and the individual who finds it replaces the tag inscribed with something that THEY are grateful for and finder becomes the hider and the situation continues. This goes on until Thanksgiving. Knowing that a glass turkey would stand no chance in my house, I knit a little white pumpkin with a small ribbon to attach the tag. There were about three rounds of hiding before it was GONE (ominous and mysterious music inserted for dramatic effect). My daughter, the last hider, assured me that she hid it on Dad's desk, which though cluttered, is not capable of swallowing our Grateful Pumpkin. The days stretched into weeks and then into a month and the Grateful Pumpkin was forgotten....until today.

I would like to lie to everybody and claim that my house is immaculately clean at all times and ready to welcome any company, but I am actually scared of being sucked into the depths of Hell for telling a lie THAT big. The truth is that my house is barely identifiable as a living structure. Every time I answer the door, I am anticipating that a caring neighbor or friend has called one of the hoarding television programs and they are coming to dig me out. But honestly, I have a fairly strict underpinning of organization in attempting to tame the chaos.

Therefore, disorganization is not the culprit in everything that disappears in the depths of my house. Sadly, the perpetrators of the majority of the disappearances in our house are not the minions. The most dreaded words in our house are, “I put it somewhere safe.” For those that are parents, you completely understand this concept. The most chaotic and abysmal places in the house are above the six-foot mark. (I am using word in the sense that it resembles an abyss in its depth and expanse not in the sense that I use it on the minions, “This room is abysmal,” meaning severe or hopeless.) This happens because my hubby or myself recognizes the fragility or importance of an artifact and in order to preserve it, we exile it to a “safe “ place never to be seen again. (Again inserting ominous music for optimal reading effect...duh, duh, DUH.)

This particular irritation comes to mind because it is nearing Christmas, and I am trying to track down all the purchases that I have made throughout the year. I am the miserly mother of six little minions, so the idea of a massive shopping spree at the end of the year is completely economically inconceivable. As I spy those little morsels of gift-giving perfection, I pick them up and stash them somewhere “safe.”

My husband's tie requirements are very specific, and being a religious family, he must own a couple of ties. I was thrilled one afternoon two years ago, when I found a perfect pink tie and anticipated stuffing it in his stocking. When I began consolidating the gifts for wrapping that year, the pink tie was missing. I knew the “safe” place in which I had squirreled the tie, so I began excavating. I found many other forgotten treasures for stocking stuffing, but no tie. After many hours of reorganizing and colorful not-so-inner monologue, I gave it up as lost. This last May, while gathering hidden birthday presents, I found the pink tie in exactly the same “safe” place that I believed I had hid it.

This is not an isolated incident. When we bought our home and received the much-anticipated key, I rushed right out and made copies, then attached my prized piece of metal to my keys and six feet of dog chain. The keys and the chain swiftly vanished. I have reorganized, redecorated and renovated my home numerous times since that day and still no sign of my keys. We have begun to theorize that there is an inter-dimensional portal in our house or perhaps a Narnian-like entrance and there is some satyr running around wearing a fashionable pink tie, sucking on teething rings and locking and unlocking the doors in my house.

My eldest son is receiving a gift that was purchased for him for him last Christmas and stored somewhere “safe”. My youngest minion is thankfully slow in teething because he is receiving a “safe” teething ring that I purchased for his birthday in October. So tonight I will consolidate our Christmas loot, old and new, and begin the seemingly endless task of wrapping the booty. Well, as soon as I find the tape; I put it in a “safe” place.

NOTE: I was going to post a picture of the infamous Grateful Pumpkin for visual interest, but apparently my minions put it someplace “safe”.