Socks are the famous culprits for getting lost in a house — how often can you not match up pairs after the laundry? – but in our abode, it’s the scissors that are in short supply.
We have plenty of pairs of scissors, and they always seem to be in the way of drawers closing, or are crowding out pens in the desktop holder, until the very moment we need them.
Then they are nowhere to be seen.
Sometimes a wail of distress sounds from the other end of the house: “Where are the scissors? I need them!”
“Did you look in your room?” I respond.
Always.
Sometimes I go up and help search the kid’s room. Sometimes I strike the paired riches of finding some scissors and a nice I-told-you-so. Other times I come up empty-handed.
The search is on for standard-use scissors we use to cut paper, twine, string and the like.
It’s always pretty easy to find the orange-handled pair. That’s because they are so old, dull and beaten up that they don’t work very well — if at all — but I’m always afraid to throw them out because at least they never get lost.
There are various sorts of scissors in the house, each to their purpose. There are scissors for haircuts and those little cosmetic-use scissors kept in the bathroom cabinet. There are a few pairs of tiny craft scissors used only in small-scale sewing, embroidery, crochet or in the making of my teen daughter’s woven bracelets. Sometimes the regular household scissors can found in tangles of craft items.
In the kitchen is a great pair of KitchenAid scissors used in food preparation. There used to be an equally good pair of kitchen scissors from the old J.C. Penney Outlet, but they got taken outside and turned into gardening scissors some years ago. They still work admirably well for the abuse they’ve taken.
Then there are the holy grail of scissors: the fabric scissors. I have inoculated my daughter with the same fear and respect of fabric scissors that my mother did me and my sister. They are never, ever to be touched, unless it is for cutting fabric, and then, with the appropriate reverence they are due.
Those scissors are usually where they belong, but what we’re looking for is a pair of standard paper-cutting scissors.
But why don’t we just buy another pair of scissors?, any logical person may ask.
It’s because around once a year, somehow, the paper scissors have a magical reunion. There’s a pair in the cup on the desk, and when you open the drawer, there are several pairs in there.
It happens without us noticing.
So until that happens again, we’ll keep looking.
