Lost and Found

    When traveling abroad, I try very hard not to shop too much.  Between baggage fees when flying and lugging bags around from place to place, I hate to add weight to the bags by shopping too much.  What I do like to find is something the place is known for, and if that is too big (or expensive) I find a little something that will simply be a good reminder of my trip.  When I traveled to Portugal I really wanted to come home with tile and pottery, but talk about weighing things down.  Instead I bought a handbag made of cork AND a Portuguese rooster.  The bag made it home safely, but the rooster somehow didn't.  I had packed it inside the zipper pouch of this neck pillow I had brought on the plane.  I brought the pillow for the flight to/from, but ended up never using it because the seats I sat in had adjustable headrests and were more comfortable without the pillow.  I found a some space inside the pillow to keep the little statue safe before tossing it in my suitcase. But upon returning home, unpacking, and returning to work it occurred to me about a month later that I didn't remember unpacking the pillow or the little rooster.  I figured the pillow never actually got packed, and must have been left in the room.  That was 2013.
   Flash forward to 2017 in Kona, Hawaii.  A couple of days into visiting my mom, I had taken her car for some last minute gift shopping after dropping her off at her physical therapy appointment (she had knee replacement surgery on her other knee this November and is on the mend).  I got done a bit early, so went back to the house to put things away.  As I was driving into the garage I noticed a yellow neck pillow sitting on the workbench area in the garage.  When my mom drives the car, whoever is in the passenger seat has to get out of the car before she drives in because she has to get too close to the workbench which is why I hadn't noticed it before.  It took me a moment, but then I did a double take.  "That looks just like my pillow," I said out loud as I got out of the car.
   Sure enough, my "lost in Portugal" pillow was sitting on a workbench in Hawaii.  And still inside the zipper pouch was the Portuguese rooster wrapped in tissue.  When I asked my mom about it she said that I had left it at her house the last time I had been there.  She had bought it for me for Christmas just before going to Portugal and had assumed I didn't like/want it after leaving it there. I'm not quite sure how it made it's way from Portugal to Hawaii without me knowing about it...maybe it fell out of a pocket I hadn't checked.  Who knows!  But now my rooster of luck and happiness is sitting on a bookshelf in California.