Yesterday I shared with a bunch of friends that I’d invoked a prayer to St. Anthony in desperation on a hunt for my eyeglasses, up against the clock ticking toward a not-to-be-missed medical appointment.<\/p>\n
Obviously they were in the condo, but I’d searched everywhere I’d been, everywhere I hadn’t been, even into closets I hadn’t touched. I knew I’d taken them off to take a shower; there were a limited number of places I could have put them.<\/p>\n
I peered out into the dark, rainy morning. I knew I’d be a hazard if I tried to drive without them. Finally, I decided to give St. Anthony a try.<\/p>\n
I’m a convert to Catholicism. Many of the quirky prayers and beliefs associated with this faith-for-the-masses I scoffed at during my upbringing as a proper Episcopalian and haven’t made much attempt to learn about them since joining the Church. Still, I remembered a children’s prayer I’d read somewhere (probably in a novel about somebody’s Catholic childhood) so I chanted, feeling very silly indeed:<\/p>\n
Tony, Tony, turn around!<\/em> Then I shrugged my shoulders, said, Oh well<\/em>, and walked into the bedroom.<\/p>\n Hmm, maybe they fell off the nighstand and under the bed?<\/em> <\/p>\n I got to my knees and peered under the bed. Oh, well,<\/em> I muttered yet again, preparing myself to come up with Plan B and bracing myself against the bed frame and the nightstand on my knees to stand up.<\/p>\n And there were my glasses, right at eye level, lying on a coverlet whose pattern obscured them from my weak vision when viewed from above (because I had looked 50 times on the bed for them at least) but perfectly obvious when viewed from this angle.<\/p>\n Thank you St. Anthony!<\/em> I whooped, put the glasses on my nose, the dog in her crate, and headed for my appointment.<\/p>\n To my amazement, upon opening my car door, there between the door and the driver’s seat lay a set of keys I’d lost ten days ago. A double whammy!<\/em><\/p>\n How does it work? It does work! I know it works! <\/em>I marveled.<\/p>\n I think it’s this: We are literally blinded by our own efforts and anxieties. The minute we turn it over to a Higher Power, the blinkers are removed and we are given to see what we could not see just moments before. Somehow we take that concern and set it aside, and…trust.<\/p>\n And though there are many long, adult, theologically puffed-up prayers to ask St. Anthony’s assistance in finding lost items, I think I’ll stick with the tried and true.<\/p>\n I seem to recall someone saying that we needed to approach our faith as a little child anyway,<\/p>\n <\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Yesterday I shared with a bunch of friends that I’d invoked a prayer to St. Anthony in desperation on a hunt for my eyeglasses, up against the clock ticking toward a not-to-be-missed medical appointment. Obviously they were in the condo, but I’d searched everywhere I’d been, everywhere I hadn’t been, even into closets I hadn’t…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=44"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=44"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=44"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dhr.tiltedchair.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=44"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Something’s lost and must be found!<\/em><\/p>\n