This is Alpha, the first-born, when he was 2YO.
This is Beta, the second-born, when he was about 2YO.
This is Gamma, the third-born, when he was about 18MO.
Losers Weepers
May
19
2021
This is kind of a part 3 of our spring break trip to Texas.
The trip home from Texas was mostly uneventful. We got home, we unpacked somewhat, went to bed no problems, got up the next day, had breakfast, attended church, did some relaxing (day of rest) in the afternoon, bedtime, morning again – nothing out of the ordinary.
Partway through Monday, Some Wife needed something out of her wallet and when she opened it, she noticed she did not have her drivers license in her wallet. She checked the rest of her purse, then she checked her carry-on bag that unpacked already, then we checked the other carry-on bag.
Nothing.
I checked the van. I checked the luggage again. I checked the van again.
Nothing.
I blame TSA.
We knew she had her license when we got on the plane, because we had to show ID at the gate, as well as at security to get into the terminal. Our flight had been randomly chosen for a secondary check. So she had to scan her boarding pass as well as Gamma’s and Delta’s boarding passes, and show her ID, then carry all her stuff through the plane to our seats.
My plan was that she would take one kid and I would take the other, but we were all together and she was first so they asked her for the boarding passes and she had them all so she obliged them. I had to scan my own boarding pass, and Alpha and Beta were responsible for themselves too.
Anyway, in all the hustle and bustle of the extra ID check at the gate, stowing the carry-on luggage in the overhead bin, getting settled in the right seat, and making sure the kids were doing the right thing (in-seat entertainment screens for everybody, so no problem getting them to sit down), her drivers license didn’t make it back in the wallet.
Ok, back to Monday. I called the airline for the items-lost-on-the-plane department. Their phone menu has a selection for that, but all it does is direct you to the website. I don’t know that you could talk to a person about that if you wanted. So I went to the website (it’s actually a third-party company that seems to run that type of stuff for them and maybe some others) and put in our information. I figured the item was easily identifiable enough – if they found it they would know whose it was. I got an email saying they got the request. And I checked on the status later that day and they were still looking for it.
That evening, I looked into what it would take to get a replacement license. Actually, I was looking to see if I could even get her into the SOS (Michigan’s DMV) to get a new license. Next appointment was weeks away.
But they did happen to offer some online services to renew things, and a replacement license request was one of the services. And it was only $9.00, so I decided to go that route. If the airline did find the license, we’d be out only $9, and if they didn’t find it we’d be all set.
It was mostly the unknown that made me decide to order the license. Otherwise it would be a guessing game – how long do we wait for them to find it? how long can we go with my driving everywhere? But if I ordered a license, there’s no more unknown.
So I ordered the license that night. I was able to print out a temporary license that was valid until her actual license was received, so she was never inconvenienced at all (since we had no plans to go anywhere that Monday anyway). A few days later, her new license showed up in the mail and all was good.
Then a couple days after that, she got a letter from someone we didn’t know. With her full name on it. She opened it up and some person from New York had found her license and returned it. It was mailed from NY, so that person must have been on the next flight in that plane, and found it and decided to be a Good Samaritan and return it to its rightful owner.
That explained why the airline was having trouble finding it; I cancelled the lost item request to help their system out. And I saved the old license in a safe place (because to order a replacement license you have to know your license number, which we didn’t know without her license, which was a bit of circular logic until I remembered somewhere I had documented her drivers license number).
And while I do appreciate the finder of the drivers license being kind enough to send it back, I do think that was not the best thing to do.
The moral of this story: if you find something that has been lost on and airplane or at an airport, please turn it into the authorities there.
Since we didn’t discover it was missing until our second day home, I’d bet if that person had turned it in when they found it, it would have been registered in the system by the time we put in our request, and we would have been matched up with it fairly quickly. We might not have gotten the license right away, but we would have known right away where it was and that we were able to get it back.
I was glad to get it back though, even if it was already replaced by the new one, because then I didn’t have to worry about someone putting her license to nefarious use and her getting implicated for something, or us having identity or credit problems later. So if you are the person who mailed the license back, thank you.
When a person sins and acts unfaithfully against the Lord, and disavows the rightful claim of his neighbor regarding a deposit or a security entrusted to him, or regarding robbery, or he has extorted from his neighbor, or has found what was lost and lied about it and sworn falsely, so that he sins regarding any of the things that people do;
Leviticus 6:2-4
This little article thingy was written by Some Guy sometime around 6:27 am and has been carefully placed in the Mishaps category.
May 19th, 2021 at 8:53 am
Tip: We keep photo copies of DL’s, passports, etc.
May 25th, 2021 at 12:49 am
I might disagree with your moral in this specific case. You’re trusting that the employee who was given the license can bother to take it to the right office, fill out the inevitable paperwork involved, etc. Then the lost-and-found people would have to log it in, store it properly, etc. Then the people you contact would have to look it up correctly, go to the trouble of physically retrieving it, etc.
That’s a lot of et ceteras to go right, when they’re going to get their paychecks whether or not you get your license back.
Unless you find the license of a military wife. Then it may be issued from a state three assignments ago, having an address from two assignments ago (in a different state). So don’t try to mail that one.