The Scavenger Hunt

My “favorite” thing is when my son, in college, calls me up to ask me to send up a box of “necessities.” This happens quarterly. To be fair, he lives in a place with changing seasons, usually has to change housing each quarter due to how the school works with on/off terms, and doesn’t like to bring too much for small rooms. I get it. The problem is that he will call and ask for the most random assortment of items for me to ship and not really know where any of it is located. Thus, the scavenger hunt begins!

This week I had my quarterly fun. He needed his mic stand. Easy, I saw that the last time I vacuumed! This is going to be easy! Ha! I got cocky too fast. Next, he asked for incense (he’s living in his fraternity house this term, so I totally get this request…he said he spent 3 days just cleaning before he would unpack anything. Now that’s character building!). I searched around and finally found those materials on his desk under a pile of books. You know, the natural location for something you use fire to start. But yay! I found it.

Then he said he wanted his soccer cleats, shin guards and soccer socks. Hmm. That used to be in our mud room/laundry room when he actually lived here and played soccer multiple times a week. I headed there first. Denied. I sent a text. He said to try the garage. Denied. He said, “Oh, I might have put the bag in my room.” Cool. The room is a bit, shall we say, stuffed and messy. But I found the bag shoved between his desk and a cabinet. Logical! I was so excited to immediately find his (dirty) cleats, (filthy) shin guards, and, wait, only one sock. Why only one sock? Shouldn’t all these things be together in this bag? I took the picture and asked him for suggestions. He had to think for a while and asked me to retrace my steps back to where I found the bag. And you know what? The second sock was stuffed behind the cabinet. SUPER logical! I love that he was able to direct me there.

Finally I added the remaining items. Luckily I knew where the snacks were, since I bought them. And I knew where his new retainer was because I picked it up that day from the orthodontist since he had broken the old one. Hopefully, I have a full quarter to prepare for the next scavenger hunt, but we will see. I have found that kids manage to throw little surprises at you right and left. I like to think maybe they do it on purpose to keep my mind agile. It’s like doing word puzzles and eating blueberries.