St. Anthony and Tess come through for us

Sometimes when I’m in the middle of something else, I see things happening that I might normally try to head off – nothing dangerous or terrible, just things that I know can lead to life being much harder – and I just can’t get it together to prevent the difficulties ahead. 

For instance, when I was both on the phone and making dinner the other evening, I noticed that Tess had my Zune.  Amusingly, she was walking around talking on it like it was a phone.  Cute, right?  Yes, but I immediately thought, “She’s going to set it down somewhere and lose it, and I will have trouble finding it.”  Years of experience, my friends, years of experience speaking right there.

So the next day, when I thought, “I should listen to my audiobook while I [fill in whatever chore I was going to do right then],” and went to unplug the Zune from where it charges, I saw…no Zune.  And I remembered.  I was right, too, in that I could not find the thing anywhere.  I asked Tess (because even though I didn’t really think it would help, I thought I’d at least try).  She brought me to where my Zune usually charges, and pointed to the earbuds that she’d thoughtfully left there for me.  “There’s your Zune, Mama.”  Ah, well, it was worth a try.  Nobody else had seen it, either. 

I prayed to St. Anthony and looked around at about Tess height throughout the main floor of the house.  I looked in the finished basement, and I looked in the kids’ rooms upstairs.  Nothing.  I thanked God that Tess is at least temporarily out of her phase of throwing away everything she can get her hands on and resigned myself to a fairly long wait for my Zune.

The next day, Tess expressed that she’d like a particular CD at Quiet Time.  Tess is a bit tyrannical about music at Quiet Time (among other things) – she like what she likes, and Quiet Time is not quiet if she’s forced to listen to something she hasn’t requested.  Eventually we’re hoping she’ll become more reasonable, but for the sanity of the family, we humor her right now.  The CD she requested for that day is one that’s on the digital player we use for her bedtime, and it’s hooked up to a travel speaker that we have, which zips open to reveal a place to store CDs and a little pocket for accoutrements.  When we travel, we put the digital player in that pocket, zip it closed, and have a handy travelling music system. 

Hannah generously fetched the digital player and speaker.  Tess opened the zip pocket of the speaker, reached in, and pulled out…my Zune.  “Here’s your Zune, Mama.”  She was a bit surprised at my level of excitement about that Zune, but the surprise was pretty amazing.  I hadn’t actually entertained the idea that my 2-year-old would find the thing she’d lost, nor that it would be in a place where she used to see us put it often, when we had used the Zune for her bedtime digital player. 

So, thank you St. Anthony and Tess for finding my Zune.