LOST AND FOUND
I Couldn’t Find My Felco Pruners
When all else fails, pray
Yesterday, I worked in the yard. There’s a smallish area that was completely overgrown: lots of large leaf avens, cleavers, brambles, too much lemon balm, huge comfrey plants past their prime, falling over; a shrub that sprouted from a trunk that had survived a storm three years ago needed pruning. A new ginkgo tree that was lost in the avens. Grass gone wild had blurred the garden edges.
I’d do some serious thinning, weeding, pruning and reclaim the lovely spot.
So, I got out the shovel, the rake, and my Felco pruners and got busy. While cutting the comfrey, I thought to save it, dry it, and make comfrey oil. I’d heard a great story about a cow that was going to be “put out to pasture” but a farmer said he’d take it.
He fed the cow lots of comfrey and shortly, the cow was healed. She had a healthy calf, for which she produced plenty of milk.
Comfrey is also called bone knit — good for healing bones. Legends abound about healing with comfrey, which has been a folk remedy for hundreds of years.
So, I got out a tarp and laid the cut comfrey on it. Throughout the day, I moved the tarp around the yard to keep the cuttings in the sun to dry them out.
When finished with my work, I put everything away, or so I thought. I pride myself on keeping track and taking care of my tools.
In the evening when I went out to cut leaves from the comfrey stalks, I couldn’t find my pruners. There’s a spare, so I used those, but it bothered me no end to have misplaced them — they’re great tools and Felcos are not inexpensive.
As I clipped leaves, I went over what I’d done and where I’d been with the gardening project. Had they inadvertently fallen into the wheelbarrow and been covered with debris?
After finishing the comfrey trim and putting all of that away, I checked the debris pile. I went through it twice, moving, sifting through the weeds, leaves, branches, and ouch, blackberry vines deposited earlier. Not there.
I retraced my steps on the way from the garden to the debris pile, a trek I made three times that morning, about 100 yards distant. Nope. Didn’t see them on that pathway.
I checked the garden where I’d been working — had they fallen into the thick foliage next to it? In the huge iris fronds, the periwinkle? Nope.
Though I looked for about an hour, I didn’t find them. I resigned myself to my loss and went in for the night.
A glorious clear blue sky greeted me the next morning. I had a few things I wanted to do before getting on the road, but first, I wanted to find the pruners.
I sifted through dead heads in the compost pile; under the rhodies because after I cleaned the little garden, I worked on the rhododendrons for a while, though I didn’t use the pruners on them.
And I prayed: I hired the heavens and asked the celestial work force to guide me to them.
I looked in the debris pile again — sifting through the branches, leaves, weeds and blackberry vines, this time with gloves on. Twice. No, they hadn’t found their way into the debris pile overnight.
I walked the path that I’d pushed the wheelbarrow on three times, I looked on the back porch, on the deck, in the garage, in my car, which didn’t make sense, unless I’d mindlessly laid them in one of these areas. I’m fully capable of doing things mindlessly.
What came to me is that even though they have red handles, they’re still not that easy to spot. Even though the grass isn’t in need of a mow, I remembered that when I was working and put them down nearby, I couldn’t see them unless I was pretty much standing over them.
Oh, I knew I’d find them, but would it be days, weeks, or years hence, like I found a stainless-steel gadget in the deepest layer of compost when I was distributing that rich brown gold?
Back to the front of the house, to the back of the house, on the front porch, inside the house, had I thoughtlessly put them on the kitchen counter? On the hutch in the foyer? No.
Outside again. About twenty feet from the area I’d been cleaning the day before, I stopped. I’d been looking for an hour. I prayed again, “please guide me to them,” and when I looked down, there they were, at my feet in the grass. And truly, I’d been within a few feet of that spot many, many times while searching but I didn’t see them. Until that moment.
Gratitude. A prayer of thanks.
And elation.
There’s nothing like being reunited with something that’s been lost.
A few more photos: