I get many things from my mom – her straight dark brown hair, her love for travel and her passion for reading.
And, yes, her finicky memory.
Walking from one room to another in my small apartment, I can easily forget what I was looking for. Every morning I have to hunt for my keys and wallet, which requires adding five to 10 minutes to my schedule.
When it comes to long-term memory, my mother and I both excel. But the small, everyday stuff escapes our minds.
I know I get this particular trait from my mom because of the garage door opener.
Before a family trip to Colorado 14 years ago, my mother took the garage door opener out of her parked car, which was in the garage, and hid it in the house. The logic was not completely sound, but it made sense to her at the time.
Where did she hide the opener? Well, that is a question my family started asking in 2005.
Over the years, it became an inside family joke.
The four kids decided that, after our parents left the Earth, whoever among us found the opener would inherit the house and everything in it. We envisioned having a shotgun start at the top of the driveway, just like at a track meet, and then racing to find the prize.
Although it was intended as a joke, the truly funny part of this, at least to me, is that I can totally see me and my siblings doing something like that.
However, my mom ruined our fun last month.
In the midst of some major spring cleaning, she found the opener hiding in a file folder of insurance paperwork, tucked away in her desk. In the end, she was right; the most dedicated thief would never have uncovered it.
My disappointment, and that of my siblings, was a bit of a surprise. Our running joke at every holiday and family get-together would now have to be laid to rest.
What always made the joke better is that my parents never bought a new garage door opener. My mom was sure she’d find the old one “soon,” and her expectation dragged on, year after year.
My dad texted a photo of the opener to our family group.
“GAME IS OVER,” he commented. “Mom is the winner.”
My brother-in-law claimed that Mom had cheated. After all, she hid it, she found it.
But what’s a family to do? We can’t ask for a do-over. We’ll just have to inherit our parents’ possessions in the normal way.
Just like my mother, I have a penchant for hiding things and then forgetting where they might be.
After I was assigned this column, I had a spark of an idea one night at home, so I went to grab my laptop to write it down quickly.
Oops. My laptop was Missing In Action.
I always figure a potential burglar should have to work to get my laptop, so I don’t leave it in plain sight. Usually, I hide it in my dresser drawer, or under my pillow or in the closet. But, nope, it was in none of those places.
After spending a half-hour looking for the thing, I found it in a storage tub of yarn and knitting supplies.
No burglar would ever look there, right? Suddenly, my mother’s reasoning looked a lot like my own. Her apple had not fallen far from the tree.
Given our common inclination, my mother and I have both developed some coping mechanisms to find our belongings.
For keys, she uses the low-tech option of a key hook. Given my generation, I use Tile, an app on my phone.
My keychain is equipped with Bluetooth and when I lose it, I push the “Find my keys” button and listen for the electronic beep.
I could demonstrate it for anyone who is interested – if I could just find my phone.
