I almost lost "The Lost Blue Riding Hood." Here is how it happened. When I take my walks among the avenues where I live, I often walk past this beautiful iron fence and its equally beautiful house.
I call it the lilac house because it is painted the loveliest shade of old-fashioned lilac. A few weeks ago, I noticed a very small blue riding hood hanging on the corner of the iron fence that surrounds the lilac house. A sea-blue jacket with a hood. It looks to be a girl's jacket because there are little flowers along its hem. I think it is about the right size for a four-year-old girl.
Several weeks went by, and this little garment continued to hang there, waiting to be found. I was working on getting this blog up and running, and I made a mental note to do a post about "The Lost Blue Riding Hood." Then last Sunday I walked by again, and as it was still there, I thought maybe I better get a photo soon. This instant, for example. By the time I had this thought, I had already passed the lilac house by about a block, going south on the avenues away from where I live.
So I retraced my steps.
But at this very moment a woman in the red-shingled cottage just to the left of my prize came out of her front door in her bathrobe, wielding a broom. And she began to sweep her porch.
So, brave soul that I am, I kept on walking, going north now, back toward home. I continued one block north, then halted in the middle of the street. For that little jacket wouldn't be hanging there forever. This might be my only chance.
I walked back to take my photo. But there was this woman, sweeping away at her porch. She might be the kind of person who just keeps on sweeping. Do you know the kind? They sweep their porch and their fronts steps and their sidewalk, and then they start in on the street. Soon they're off sweeping the whole world. That kind.
So I kept on walking right past her ~ again ~ and went one block south ~ again. Stopped. Got myself turned around. Walked back north ~ again. And at this point I am in some danger of being arrested for erratic behavior. But, really, I cannot help being in an altered state of mind when the world confronts me with both brooms and riding hoods ~ for these kinds of things throw me into fairytale mode.
Well, I almost kept on walking straight back home, but now, you see, I've got this blog. I've got responsibilities to my multitude of readers. So I did a due-west turn, plopped my backpack onto the curb, crouched down before The Lost Blue Riding Hood, and snapped off three photos, one, two, three, inching forward each time, in a kind of duck waddle. (Aha! I have since learned that my camera has this wonderful thing called a Zooooom!)
And the broom woman in the bathrobe? Honestly, I forgot all about her. She just fell out of my mind. My whole destiny was pinned upon this little blue garment.
And here is The Big Lesson:
Now you see it.
Now you don't.
Yes, I went back the very next day and it was gone. Poof! I had almost lost the lost blue riding hood. And by only a handful of hours. Maybe minutes.
(And here is something so sweet: Do you see that the lamp on the porch of the lilac house is lit? It's just past dawn, and, yes, she has a lamp on her porch! She has made a whole little room on her front porch. I want to do that, too!)
But back to my story:
Of course, I have lost the riding hood, because it isn't there anymore, but having a photo of it makes me feel that I have captured it somehow.
Still, where did it go, I wonder. Did its rightful little owner come to claim it? Did the broom woman snatch it up the minute my back was turned?
Or, wait! Did the whole avenue, having seen a strange lady loitering and taking photos, call an emergency meeting and decide to whisk the little blue riding hood into protective custody, dye it lilac, perhaps, and embroider it with all manner of symbols and signs for warding off would-be bloggers? Well, I will probably never know, although maybe someday I could just ask. But that would spoil the mystery of it all.
Meanwhile, I am basking in the treasure that so very nearly slipped through my fingertips. The Lost Blue Riding Hood! For there is no way to know where the tiniest thing will lead you, if only you will let it take you there.
And if you want to read a blog that pays attention to the very tiniest treasures in the world, you really must read TinyHappy. You will find such joy there. In the small things. In unexpected places. In wildflowers growing out of cracks in concrete, in children's booties, in vintage buttons. TinyHappy has a way of finding the smallest detail in something that captures its very heart and soul. Please do go there. You will find peace there.
