Lost and Found

Sometimes the weight of life in our “interesting times” seems too much to bear.   So today, it’s time (really, past time) for another “Sunday Story” on Our America.  Today’s topic:  a look at a story of what gets lost, and what gets found.

Origin Story

Part of my “origin story” is my parents’ religious beliefs.   Mom was British, but of Irish ancestry.  So no surprise, she was Roman Catholic.  Dad’s ancestry was Jewish, and so was he.  His grandfather migrated to Cincinnati from Alsace (a province between Germany and France) after the Franco-Prussian War in the 1870’s.  Mom was an “operative” in the British Special Operations Executive during World War II, a “spy” if you will.  Dad was a Warrant Officer in the US Army based in England, assigned to the finance section.  They met on a blind date in London and quickly fell in love.

A Jewish man and a Catholic woman getting married was frowned upon by both religions.   But it was when Mom refused to promise that any children would be raised Catholic, that the local priest actually ex-communicated her from the church.  She was denied the religious sacraments that she grew up with.  But, while Mom could no longer practice Catholicism, the traditions of the Church were still strong within her.  (The story goes, that when the Priest arrived at my grandparents’ house to inform Mom of the ex-communication, my Grandfather hastened his exit by punching him in the nose). 

Episcopalian

We kids were brought up in the Episcopal Church.  The apocryphal story is that it was as close as Mom could get to Catholic without “crossing the line”. As a rule, Episcopalians aren’t worried about the hierarchy of the Saints.  But we Dahlman kids definitely knew two Saints, for sure. 

 The first was St. Anthony, the patron Saint of lost “things”.  Whenever something was lost, Mom was sure to pray to St. Anthony to help return it to the owner.  And the second was Saint Jude.  He was the patron of “impossible causes”.  So if Anthony didn’t come through, perhaps Jude would do “the impossible”. (That mission is why the hospital in Memphis for desperately ill children is named for St. Jude). 

Glasses

In third grade, we discovered that my vision was really, really, bad.   The school lined us kids up in the lunch serving line (really), and had us look down to the other end at an eye-chart on the exit door wall. I discovered that everyone else could read several lines down the page.  Me, it was the big “E”, and maybe a shot at the second line of “F,P”.  The third line “T,O,Z” was really just a guess, and after that, it was a total blur until they let me walk up by the cash registers.  No wonder everyone else knew what was on the “old school” blackboard in the front of the class.

So I soon had glasses with thick, almost “bulletproof” lenses.   Back then, glasses were actual glass, and weighed a lot.  So as a kid I often made the choice to see less, and not have the weight on my face.

Just a note – 20/20 is “perfect vision”.   I was 20/120 in the left eye, and 20/150 in the right eye, all not good.  My right eye was worse, perhaps because I got a stick in my eye, looking up at a waterfall in the Hocking Hills when I was three. It hurt, and we ended up in what I now know was a shaky hospital in Logan, Ohio.  But I did get to play “pirate” full time with a patch on my eye for six weeks!! 

Oh Canada!!

Our family went on a summer vacation every August.   In those years, we joined several other Cincinnati families in a “retreat” to Hilton Beach, a Canadian village on St. Joseph’s Island between the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and the mainland Canadian coast. (And, as the joke went, the location of the only “Hilton Hotel” not in the Hilton chain).  Our mornings always started with a bath in the lake, water from Lake Superior about to reach Lake Huron.  It was always, always, dramatically cold.  But Dad made sure we were all in attendance, with our Cincinnati-made Ivory Soap in hand: it floats!  

Our quick immersion “bath” was soon followed by a warmup  in the “walk-in” fireplace, and a hearty breakfast of eggs, Canadian bacon, and thick white bread.   Then it was onto a day of boating, skiing, hiking; and even some quiet reading time.  I can still remember the musty-fireplace smell of the old couch, as I curled up with some “Landmark Book” about an historic figure.

We often piled in the car to tour around the area; with trips to Lornie’s Restaurant in the village, or to call home from the only pay-phone in town, or to venture across the island to old Fort St Joe.    And some years, we went on the ferry back to the Canadian mainland and to the “big town” of Bruce Mines, for their summer festival.  The “Black Watch” Scottish Highland bagpipers were there, and there were rides for us kids, and other stuff for the adults to look at.

Lost

Since I was eight years-old, I was very much “into” the rides.   My first action was to put my glasses “safely” in my pocket.  It wouldn’t do for them to fly off in the middle of some hairpin turn!!

Finally it was dark, and time to head back to Hilton Beach.  As we reached the car, I put my hand in my pocket to retrieve my glasses.  And, as you might have guessed, they were gone.  I was faced with the rest of the vacation being an actual blur, and I wasn’t happy.  But what was the possibility of finding a pair of glasses, somewhere in Bruce Mines, in the dark of night?  We headed back to the Ferry, across the St. Joseph’s Channel, to Hilton Beach.

Mom, on the other hand, was completely confident.  We’d go back in the morning, and search the high grass by the road for my glasses.  And she’d have a special discussion with St. Anthony, who surely would intercede to return my “bulletproof glasses” to my face.

Minor Miracles

The next morning, after our dip in the lake, we headed back to “the Bruce”.   We pulled up approximately to where we parked the day before, and got out to slowly comb the overgrown weeds for glasses.  As we started our quest, I heard Mom muttering:  

“ St. Anthony, who received from God the special power of restoring lost things, grant that I may find Martin’s glasses, which have been lost!”

I wasn’t the only one who thought there wasn’t much of a chance.   Dad and my sisters didn’t seem too impressed with the “power” of St. Anthony either.  But Mom was so sure; and so we searched, head’s down, trying to find a pair of glass lenses bound in the black plastic rims that were “in-style” at the time.

Fifteen minutes into the search, Mom reached down, through the weeds, and pulled my glasses out.  They were intact, ready to go right back on my face.  And she made it clear who to credit for the find:  “Thank you St. Anthony!!!”

Today, I am lapsed from pretty much all forms of religion.   Aside from weddings and funerals, it’s been decades since I’ve been inside of a Church, a Synagogue, or even a Mosque.  But there is one situation when I still mull over the idea of calling for heavenly intercession.  When I lose something, I mean, really lose something, a thing that I cannot replace and I cannot find:  I might still think (though not say aloud) about asking for some help.  I might say a silent prayer to St. Anthony.  He proved his worth!!!!  

The Sunday Story Series

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  • Lost and Found – 2/22/25

Author: Marty Dahlman

I'm Marty Dahlman. After forty years of teaching and coaching track and cross country, I've finally retired!!! I've also spent a lot of time in politics, working campaigns from local school elections to Presidential campaigns.

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