Lost Item

Among the results of our recent travels was the loss of our camera--the grown up, big purchase, keep it safe camera that we bought when point and shoot suddenly seemed not quite good enough. While I hold out some hope that my emails to every part of the airport will, when I least expect it, yield a response that the camera has been found, mostly I know in the pit of my stomach that it is gone.

It is a big loss--in value, in trust of ourselves (how could we let it disappear?), and in trust of the world (could someone really just take it, or even find it and walk away with it?). But, though that pit in my stomach remains when I think about it, and perhaps will for quite some time, I am not racing around frantically. I am not casting blame. I am not wailing. It was a good camera, but it was just a camera. Lost with it was a memory card, but just an empty memory card. We didn't, as far as I can tell, lose otherwise unsaved and irreplaceable images from our past or new images from our trip. It is a loss, to be sure, but it is a loss we will most definitely survive. Perhaps it will inform what we buy, how we pack, how we back up, and what we pay attention to going forward. But mostly, it will fade into the background of a life filled with people, and events, and just plain LIVING.

Our camera is still most certainly a lost item. But maybe we haven't lost quite so much after all...