Losing It

This past weekend was our church's retreat, this year a day affair rather than an overnighter in order to save money. It was a bit nippy in the woods, so the kids were dressed in long pants, long sleeves, sweatshirts, and hats. Of course, it only took Aaron half the day to lose his hat.

I'm not sure why, but his losing his hat caused me to practically lose it, in a figurative sense. I combed the six or seven different places on the retreat site that Aaron had been, in some cases more than twice, but all in vain. After each stop, I scolded Aaron at various volume levels.

I really do hate losing stuff. And I hate how sloppy and careless our kids are with stuff. But it was a really poor performance on my part, especially since my searching and my gruffness ate into time I should have been spending with them and with my church members.

The really lame thing is that I didn't really care about the hat itself - we have others, however misshapen, that he can get by with until we feel like buying another one - but the principle of losing something. And yet, if it was about principle, I should've realized the far more important principle at play. I did in fact lose something, far more precious, in the act of trying to find something relatively not precious. And that was quality time with my nuclear family and my church family.