Prodigals

 As I was getting ready this morning, I kicked something unseen across the floor. It chattered across the wood. "What was that?" With my ever waining eyesight, I squinted to see the object against the hardwoods of my bedroom. With creaky morning-back and legs, I bent down to pick it up. It was an earring. My earring. From the depths of my brain, I remember this earring. I remember that I searched for it. I was upset it was lost. I moved everything in my room looking for this one earring. Surely, this couldn't be THE earring I had been searching for. It had been literally years since I've laid eyes on it or its sister. If I was right, I had put the other away for safe keeping just in case the match showed back up. 

Where is that box? I searched through one of my many "junk" drawers in my room. A haven for all things miscellaneous. A refuge for things forgotten. I haven't looked at any of this in so long....where is that box? I finally uncovered the little burgundy box and opened it. There, were many earrings that had lost their mates. Old looking and tarnished, I had kept them in hopes that one day they would be reunited with their mate. Today, was someone's lucky day! It was my lucky day! I dug through the small box of misfits and there at the bottom was the match. 

I had hoped this day would come. I had done all I could do to find this little thing. I had given up as we often do. I had put it away with just a glimmer of hope that the lost part would one day be found.

It seemed like a profound reference to people as I married up the two halves of this puzzle. I have done all I could in some situations and in the end I had given up except for one small glimmer of hope. Every now and then when the time is right, that missing part will show back up...that person you thought was hopeless shows up..better. They will be tarnished and rough looking, tangled with dirt and dust, but there they are. Is it a rebelllious child, a lost friend, or an estranged husband? It could be. 

After a minute polishing up my earrings, both looked as if they had never been apart. They were a whole complete set again. They were beautiful. 

I put away the little box of misfits with renewed encouragement that one day their mate would return just as this one did. There's hope. There's always hope.