It's Always in the Last Place You Look

Thanks for the advice asshole.

Of course it's in the last place you look. I'm not going to find something I lost and then say "Welp, found em...but I just wanna go check that other spot just to be sure."

Today's experience is losing your keys.

There are few worse feelings than that sudden realization that you don't have something important. Some of the worst things include: wallet, keys, phone, and ID. (I have at one point or another lost all of these things.)

Today it was my keys. After what had been one of the longest days at work to date I had the joy of discovering that my keys were no where to be found. First you check the normal places. Messenger bag: no. The drawer where I almost always end up leaving my keys in the spa: nope. The drawers in all the other rooms just in case I wandered in there randomly: nothing. The admin office on the 2nd floor where I often borrow other people's desks to do work since I don't have a desk of my own: Nothing. My locker and workout clothes from the morning: Empty. Frantic rechecks of all of the things because I've convinced myself that clearly I wasn't thorough enough in my initial search because I just wasn't desperate enough yet: Still no keys.

Now on my keychain I have the following:

My bike key (To the bike locked up outside in an area that I wouldn't want to leave a bike overnight.)

My house key (Who needs that?)

My car key (Which costs around $100 to duplicate...know how I know that? I've lost it before)

A bottle opener (The least of my worries)

Needles to say by this point I'm a bit more than nervous. That feeling in the pit of your stomach and that voice in the back of your brain that starts to gnaw at you saying:

"You're not going to find them. They're actually gone this time. You're going to have to go through the giant pain in the ass to replace all of these keys and in the meantime figure out how to live your life with most of the things you use daily locked away. Suck on that. Oh and PS you're hungry but you're too pissed off now to eat. How's that for the cap off to the day loser?"

Maybe that's just what my voices say but I'd guess you hear similar things.

After scouring room after room at work and being unable to find them for around an hour I called the other gym location I had been at that morning for a corporate meeting to see if anyone had brought them to lost and found. The front desk girl told me there was nothing there. I hung up. I went to recheck all the spots I'd already looked using my bike light to illuminate the dark corners in which said keys could have hidden shrouded from the ambient light of my two initial searches to no avail. I called her again and told her I didn't want to be "that guy" but could she go check the room I had been in to see if she could find them. The room is in construction mode so there wouldn't be much reason for anyone to go in there to do anything that day so who could have found my keys to bring them to lost and found? Sweetly she did just that but still nothing. Unable to trust the kind-hearted young lady on the other end of the phone I decided I had to walk up the street (about 8 blocks) to the other gym. As I drug myself up the 3 flights of stairs scanning through the areas I had walked in earlier in case they were somewhere between the entrance and the room, I held on to that tiny little piece of hope that in a trembling and high pitched voice said:

"They're up there. They really are. Your night will not end like this. The girl just didn't know where to look. You know where you were sitting. You can find these. They will be there. I promise."

I got to the room. Pulled open the door and started pushing my way through piles of unassembled Pilates Reformer machines until finally landing eyes on my precious precious keys.

It's like the feeling when you stand up too fast and all the blood rushes away from your head but without making you want to pass out. That voice which had progressively gotten louder all evening telling me I was screwed and to suck it had finally been shut up and the weak little prepubescent voice of hope finally got to be heard.

After celebrating with the front desk staff a bit I made my way back to the spa to gather my things to head out. As I strapped on my helmet, hooked my reflector on my messenger back, tucked away my wallet and phone carefully in predetermined pockets to avoid the chance I might not know where they were and readying myself for the door I realized that the bike light that I had been carrying through the streets (to see if my keys had fallen out of my pocket en route to my morning meeting) was no where to be found.

I had left it in the Pilates room.

That sweet front desk girl now knows what an idiot I actually am and I'm sure doubts my abilities not only as a manager but as a functioning human being. Sometimes I don't blame her.