Frantic search for lost notebook leads to better find

Ihad lost a notebook. For a reporter, who relies on handwritten notes to help remember every detail, to recall the feel of a place, and to get quotes perfectly right — this is a big deal.

Standing there in the middle of the living room, panicked, it felt like I had lost not just the notebook but also the piece of time recorded in it — in this case, a morning that stretched into the afternoon in a Phoenix barbershop.

In 27 years as a journalist, I’ve lost notebooks only a couple of times. It’s an insecure feeling — even worse than misplacing your purse or cellphone.

I flipped through the four notebooks in my satchel and the six stacked on my desk. It wasn’t any of those.

I sorted through the pile on the little table near the front door, tossed the magazines still unread since November in the recycling bin and ran the credit-card offers through the shredder. The notebook wasn’t there either.

Not in my purse, the catchall basket on the kitchen counter, or anywhere in plain sight.

Think, think. Where else could it be?

Oh, wait. Maybe it’s in the car. I searched under every seat and from the glove box to the back door. No such luck.

And then I stood in the doorway of my house and did a mental inventory of the places a 4-inch by 8-inch spiral notebook could hide in 1,700 square feet.

The sun was warm on my back; I leaned against the door frame and sighed. It was 81 degrees, not technically spring but close enough to consider spring cleaning.

Not that my house was dirty. It gets messy now and then when we’re busy. But I grew up with a stay-at-home mom who scrubbed the kitchen grout with a toothbrush and did laundry so frequently you could practically wear the same clothes every day and they’d be clean. I never know when she might pop in, so I don’t take any chances.

But every spring the house seems to close in on me, and I turn into a madwoman, howling that we own too much stuff and snapping open big black trash bags. The good stuff goes to Goodwill, the rest in the trash.

It felt like spring. And I needed to find that notebook. So it was as good a time as any.

I shoved the couch forward, away from the wall. Behind it, there was the dog’s squeaky toy and a glittery nail file. Suddenly, the throw cushions were in the washing machine,

See BLAND, Page E4