Moments

I used to have the stereotypical blonde moment every now and then. Called senior moments now that my hair is grey, they are the times you forget something vital and don't remember it until your daughter, who lives 60 miles away and whose house you left an hour ago, answers the phone with, "We have your pocketbook, Nini!"

Of course, you knew she had since it wasn't in the grocery shopping cart when you went to pay and it wasn't in the car when you ran out of the store, waving hastily at the clerk to hold everything, you'd be back in two ticks. And then you weren't because you were tearing the car apart looking for the blessed bag that was an hour away at your daughter's house right where you'd left it.

And of course, everything you needed - credit cards, medical cards, driver's license, cell phone - were in that one bag you could be relied on to leave behind despite a taped note on your car's dashboard exhorting you to remember your pocketbook and the annoying little chimes on your iphone reminding you to grab your pocketbook on the way out the door. For the past six years you've been reminding myself with such reminders, and in those six years you've left your purse behind an embarrassing number of times.

Daughter obligingly took said pocketbook to the Post Office, wrapped it securely, and put it in the mail after being assured it would reach me the very next day. It did, intact and with a text message on the phone from daughter the day before saying it had just been mailed. Of course, she added sheepishly, she'd had a blonde moment of her own when, from the depths of the box in the Post Office clerk's hands, she heard my phone whistle to alert me that a message was on its way.

I relayed all this to my friend and cohort in aging, J, who has her own pocketbook issues. She laughed sympathetically, offered to take me with her on her trip to town, and reminded me to be sure to grab my bag before meeting her. I obligingly flung the strap over my shoulder, closed the door behind me, and met her at the end of my driveway. She grinned at me when she saw my purse and off we drove.

Ten minutes later the grin turned to grimace when she reached into the back seat for her pocketbook. "Why," she began, "where's my purse?" We both looked at the empty seat. She fumbled under the driver's seat. I searched the space between the driver and passenger seats. She got out of the car and looked in the empty trunk. Then she looked at me. I snorted. She giggled. We guffawed. "Who's going to take care of us?" we asked each other, only half in jest. Then we drove back to her house to fetch her pocketbook.