Merry Marchmas!

Those who know my family understand how bad my mother's memory is. In fairness, she doesn't really forget the important stuff -- and with a family history of Alzheimer's, I feel we'd take such a thing very seriously -- but it's still lots of fun to pick on her when relatively simple stuff slips her tender mind.

Today, the "stuff" happened to be her driver's license. It seems she misplaced it sometime after work on Friday and hasn't seen it since. Now, yesterday, while driving to recycle (the Disneyland of Momville), she pointed out to me that she didn't have her license and wasn't sure where it was. So we know that she misplaced it between the end of work Friday and Saturday morning. A pretty small window, one that shouldn't contain that many different places.

Silly me.

While I spent the better portion of the morning (post-awakening, of course, which didn't leave much left) reading the paper, drinking coffee, and working on the crossword puzzle, she ran around frantically seeking out her missing ID. She tore through pocketbooks, all the pockets of clothes she'd worn, all the places she normally frequents -- yes, the laundry room got a thorough once-over. Alas, no license.

I observed all this with mild indifference and even less concern. Knowing my mother, these things tend to just work out. And besides, she wasn't freaking out too much, so why should I?

So given my lack of caring, imagine my surprise when my mother walks into the kitchen with her hands filled with clothing and other such paraphernalia. She plopped it all on the counter and presented it to me in sequential order:

• a black Life Is Good hat featuring a guitar and the line, "Let's get together and feel alright"
• a white t-shirt with an acoustic that reads, "There are things that come before guitar...I just don't know what they are."
• three Disney World pins:
  • a recreation of the famous Partners statue, in front of Cinderella Castle
  • a Rock 'n' Roller Coaster pin shaped like a guitar pick
  • Goofy laughing out loud, with the letters LOL underneath
• and a $25 Starbucks gift card

After her presentation, she said, "Merry Christmas!" and ran off to continue searching for her license.

Turns out, in an effort to hide the swag she bought me from Disney World (which she'd planned to give me for Christmas), she hid them at the bottom of the ironing basket -- the last place she figured I'd look (and rightly so). Unfortunately, she never got to the bottom of the basket in all this time and, you guessed it, she forgot they were there. Until she found them today.

While looking for something that else that she forgot where it was.

Suddenly, the idea of Christmas in July doesn't seem like an unreasonable expectation.

(I'll close by sharing that she did end up finding her license -- in her car, right where she normally puts it. It just slid farther back into the console than it normally does, so she didn't see it upon first glance. Can't say that she isn't a creature of habit, even if that is to a fault.)