A Mystery Solved

A couple years ago I lost my passport.  One evening, a few weeks before a planned trip to Yucatán, I realized that my passport, and the neck pouch in which I always keep it, were not in their usual place.  I knew for sure that it was in the house after my previous trip, but I vaguely remembered tucking it away somewhere when I was going to be out of town for a couple days.  The question was, where did I hide it?  I started looking through the house, but I couldn't find it.  I became frantic, rummaging through every room... looking in every logical place and every illogical place as well.  After hours of searching, I finally gave up.  I needed a passport in only a few weeks, so first thing the next morning I went to the post office, reported my passport missing, and applied for a replacement.  Since I needed it soon, I paid a pretty penny for expedited processing.  Fortunately, my new passport arrived with time to spare before my scheduled departure.

For nearly two years I have wondered what happened to the old passport.  I did not run across it anywhere.  I wondered if there was a gremlin in the house, but I figured that I must have accidentally thrown it out while house cleaning.  However since I always kept it in its pouch, it would seem to be something too large to be accidentally tossed in the garbage.

A couple nights ago I was getting ready to print off this year's Christmas cards.  I knew that in the morning I needed to go to the office supply store to buy card stock and printer ink, but I checked to see if I needed to buy envelopes. There were several boxes in one of the cupboards of my computer room.  One was filled with unused Christmas cards from previous years.  A couple contained envelopes... more than enough for this year's mailing.  And then I looked in a fourth box, and there it was!  The missing pouch with my old passport!

Of course, the old passport is invalid, but it's a nice souvenir with stamps from my past travels.  And the two year old mystery has finally been solved!