Our circumstances require that we park our car on the roadside about a mile and a half from the cabin. We park on the shoulder along with our neighbors. We come and go from this parking area with varying loads of gear; often we depart hastily, rushing to cross the bay ahead of the rising tide (see Attuning to the Natural Rhythms: Livin’ By the Moon and Tide). In such situations, items get dropped or forgotten and left behind.
The road provides a popular route to walk pets or ride bikes, which means that roadside neighbors pass by the parking area often. They sometimes lose items as well.
These lost items get picked up by the next passerby. These people try to return the item to the owner, or at least get the thing off the road. They’ll set them off the shoulder, perhaps hang them in the bushes lining the road, or put them on or in a car—set it on the hood, hang it on a door handle, place it in the bed of a truck, or, if a vehicle is unlocked, inside.
Ironically, the majority of these found objects seem to end up on or in our car. I guess it’s because our car tends to be alone on the shoulder more often than the others, but it’s still puzzling.
The problem with this is that an object’s presence on a specific vehicle implies ownership. A glove stuck on a hood seems less likely to be picked up, even by the rightful owner, than one hanging on a bush. We want the stuff returned to the person who lost it, and don’t want to delay that by leaving it on our car. Worse, when we try to move these things, they often get returned to us!
Lately, we’ve been visited by a rather ironic item, a simply elegant Christian Dior cashmere scarf. I don’t follow fashion much at all, but I do recognize this as a more expensive item than we would normally own. And yet, we can’t seem to get rid of it. Michelle moved it off our car several times, but finally gave up and brought it home.
We have one neighbor who we think might own such a scarf; she’s out of town, but we can email her and ask. We’ll also place a “Listener Personal” on the local radio station, seeking the owner.
If we can’t find the owner, I’m not sure what will become of it. We each have our favorite scarves, which we use when a scarf seems called for. None of us hanker to wear Christian Dior. Maybe we’ll post it on Ebay . . . .
Local readers, if you think this may be your scarf, please tune into KHNS for the Listener Personal for our contact number!
What about building a unique Lost & Found box to sit permanently along the road side area where ALL items could be placed – with a note attached when needed for clarification. I am sure YOU could come up with a humorous theme to design such a box (from your scrap lumber). Actually, this box could be used as a drop-off and pick-up box when you are sharing some item with a neighbor, etc. I guess in the middle of winter though “the box” would not be seen if buried in a roadside drift! Oh well, this was just an off-the-cuff idea from your favorite blog reader in Northern California.
Hi Judy, GREAT idea! I have to add it to the dozens of other “roadside attraction” schemes that the neighborhood comes up with, including mobile storage sheds, bike racks, emergency bungalows–all of which would not last longer than it took for the state to discover that we’d built illegally on the roadway.