The Lost Lineup
1. My Wedding Ring
2. My camera- really Drew's camera, but we had to use his because ours stopped working
3. So my camera- not lost, just broken
4. My 14 year old University of Memphis Tigers hat
5. My Oakley sunglasses and blue Croakies
6. Drew, my son
7. Camera battery and charger
Their Respective Locations
1. FOUND! Lost in the sand volleyball court at Lulu's, a local restaurant. Found the next morning with the aide of a metal detector. See story below.
2. Found! It was in the front pocket of my hoodie the whole time. Luckily it was only lost for about 10 minutes before I realized this.
3. Again, not lost. But still not working.
4. The Gulf of Mexico
5. The Gulf of Mexico
6. FOUND! Drew and I were working on packing the car and we had gone down to the ground to get a cart to assist us. Drew got back on the elevator, but I had trouble steering the cart and it got between the two of us and the elevator door closed. Luckily Drew had been pushing the elevator buttons all week, so he pushed the button to our floor and ran to it and knocked until Katie opened it. He was only out of sight for a couple minutes at most, but it was terrifying.
7. Left in the condo in Orange Beach, AL. Of course it was basically an extra since the camera isn't working anyways.
It was about our third or fourth night there and we decided to go to Lulu's for dinner. It's owned by Jimmy Buffet's sister and always has good food, good music, and is a lot of fun for the kids. It is on a marina and has a big area of sand for the kids to play in- a place to dig and things like that, plus a sand volleyball court. Usually there is about an hour wait and the kids spend it playing in the sand. Well, on this particular night there was no wait and we were seated right away. We ate dinner without any problems. Well, Drew wasn't going to go to Lulu's without getting to play in the sand. So we went and played in the sand volleyball court and began to hit the ball back and forth to each other. After a few times I hit one a little bit harder and as I hit it and made my follow through I felt and heard my wedding ring slip off my finger. I immediately froze and told Drew to go get Katie, then just began yelling for her to come help. I didn't want to start moving and cause the sand to shift, but there were kids around and I was afraid someone else would mess up the sand or step on it if I didn't start looking.
I looked all around where I was standing without any luck. As we began to panic I got my wits back and realized I had to have some kind of order to my search. I started at the net and went in straight lines back and forth throughout the side where I had been standing. Katie helped, her brother helped, and various strangers helped. The staff came out and brought flashlights and a couple of them even helped. I eventually got down on my hands and knees with a flashlight and repeated my line by line search. No luck. A staff member brought out a metal detector, but we weren't sure if it was working or really how to use it. They told me their staff tomorrow would look and would have a better metal detector. I kept looking. Then I got some good advice from an 8 year old who was helping me look. He said: "I don't think you're supposed to wear a ring when you play volleyball." Then: "Actually you just shouldn't get married at all I think." After maybe an hour and a half of looking I didn't know where else or how else to look and decided I would meet the workers out there the next morning.
After a fitful night of sleep I returned to Lulu's at about 6:30 the next morning. It was cold. I met two workers outside who were shoveling sand off the sidewalks. They had not been told about the lost ring. And unfortunately there was no super hi-tech metal detector, only the same one from the night before. But one of the guys knew how to work it this time. They told me they had found a couple diamond rings in the past, but never found a $10,000 dollar earring a lady lost, even after the people paid to have special equipment brought out there. We found a lot of rocks and about 27 cents. After about thirty minutes of digging it wasn't looking good. Then we got a beep about ten feet almost directly in front of where I had been standing, just short of the net. With just a small amount of digging the metal detector operator was holding my ring! I slipped it back and my panic and despair turned into one big smile. We let out a few celebratory shouts and I gave the guys a reward for their help. I got back in the car and called Katie and then my parents with the good news. Fortunately the rest of the vacation was great, instead of the miserable experience it could have been had we not found my ring. And no, I did not wear my ring any the rest of the trip.
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