i felt that i FINALLY LEARNED MY LESSON about hooking my glasses to the front of my shirt when wearing my prescription sunglasses, since i’d lost and miraculously found them TWICE.

learned lesson.

or not.

yesterday morning i woke up at 7:24, staggered out of bed, went out onto the porch where kevin was drinking coffee/reading the paper, and asked him if amy had been out walking yet.  “she just left about three minutes ago,” he said.  BUT I WANTED TO GO TOO.  “you could probably catch her – do you want me to give you a ride to the spencer house?”

our walk goes down the lake road to the spencer house, used to be the university president’s house, and we cut through the yard to the field across from UIS.

OK I’LL HURRY i said.  mind you, i’d been up all of two minutes.  i threw on my clothes, grabbed my new clip-on sunglasses from wal-mart that were only $16 so it wouldn’t be a tragedy when i lost them.  i hooked them over the front of my shirt even though there are no side pieces to actually hook onto anything and said to myself that i’d put them on when i got in the car.

i threw myself into the car, slathered on sunscreen during the two-minute car ride, and when kevin stopped at the end of the driveway of the spencer house i hurtled out and onto the grass.

i ran full-out, and by now i’d been up about seven minutes.  not fully awake.  i huffed and puffed down the lane between the now-towering columns of corn and after running for about three minutes i REMEMBERED MY SUNGLASSES.

they were gone, of course.  but i figured that i’d only been running a very short distance, i knew the path where i’d gone, i almost definitely lost them in kevin’s car while frantically applying sunscreen as well as putting on my shoes.

i ran into the field and didn’t see anybody out there.  OH NO WHAT IF SHE DIDN’T GO THIS WAY?

but of course she must have because it was the only way to go.

i kept running, trying not to have a heart attack, and saw a figure way up ahead.  the person didn’t look like they had any dogs with them so i figured it was some other woman out walking.  i could ask her if she’d seen a woman with three dogs.

but as i got a little closer i saw that it was amy.  i thought i shouldn’t yell because she’d have to stop, and she wouldn’t want to stop.

after a few more winded breaths i decided this was a stupid idea so i started yelling AMY! MOLLIE!  surely one of them would hear me.

finally, as i was about to expire, she turned around and saw me.  victory!

amy let mollie off her leash and the dog ran as fast as she could to get me.

it was a very happy reunion for all.  amy said that when they walked she’d let mollie off the leash, but instead of bounding off into the corn like she always did, mollie hung by amy’s side.  she was sad because i wasn’t there.

so everybody was happy, i explained about my missing sunglasses, we had a good laugh about the fact that at least this time they weren’t REALLY lost.

when we got back to the row between the corn we looked for them and amy commented that losing my glasses made the walk seem more like a treasure hunt.  we didn’t find them, but no worries about that, they must be at home.

i got back home and expected to see them on the counter, because kevin must have seen them in his car.

nope, not there.  OH NO WHERE ARE THEY?  but maybe they were still in his car because he hadn’t seen them.

i walked around the dining room and suddenly my glasses appeared.

they had dropped down into my shirt.

it was CLEARLY A MIRACLE that they hadn’t fallen out during my pre-awake dash to catch up with amy.  they hadn’t fallen during our long walk.

if they HAD fallen out it never would have occurred to me to realize that that’s what happened to them.

sunglasses angel.  definitely i have one.

luckily today it is very cloudy and i’ll leave my sunglasses at home.

ok then,

wednesday grace.