I spent most of the day working outside; I cut off all of the herbs and other plants that had frozen a week or so ago and threw them away, and after Bob left for work I got out the leaf blower and picked up a lot of leaves in the back yard and most of the leaves in the front yard.

Our neighbor (we share the front yard) had raked up most of the leaves in the front, and I caught her outside this morning when I went out to get the paper and told her that I would pick them all up, not to worry about bagging them. It was a big job, though. I was worn out by the time I'd finished, AND I had a tragedy--I lost a little silver bell that I had been wearing on a chain.

As I was emptying the blower bag on the last trip, I noticed that the silver chain I was wearing was hanging around my neck, broken. I know what happened--when I'm using the leaf blower, there's a strap that goes across my body and around my neck to hold the leaf bag. The bag gets heavy and I'll occasionally lift up on it and shift it to a more comfortable place on my shoulder.

I imagine on one of those shifts the chain got caught and the little jump ring bent, and the charm fell off. I have no idea where or when it fell, it could be anywhere. And chances are that I sucked it up into the leaf blower, in which case it would be mangled since I had it set on "mulch." I thought about dumping out all the leaves the pawing through them, but there didn't seem to be much point. I walked all over both the back and front yards several times, seeing if by some miracle I might find it, but no luck.

It certainly wasn't an expensive piece (and I'm very grateful that that chain was the one that broke and not the gold one with the diamond, which I was also wearing), but I really liked it a lot. It was a little, plain sterling silver bell, like a jingle bell. I bought it at Kohl's, but when I bought it, it was the only one. I suppose it might be worth calling the other Kohl's store and seeing if by chance they have one. It was actually attached to an anklet, but I took it off and put it on a longer pendant chain.

Oh well. Not a tragedy, really. But it made me sad. I hate to lose things, and almost never do, so when I do, it really gets to me. I still remember losing a garnet earring probably twenty years ago in a hotel room, and I recently lost a gold hoop earring that I'm still looking for. I just refuse to believe or admit that I've really lost it.