Mister, Can We Have Our Ball Back?

This is a two-months late letter to the man from France who stole my daughter’s backpack in Barcelona.

Dear Sir:  In July, you began talking with two young American women taking their first trip around Europe.  They had been there only a couple of days.  Everything my daughter had was in her backpack:  clothes, medication, toiletries.  And you took it all. 

I don’t really care about the clothes, the medication, or the toiletries.  But also in that backpack was a notebook, a journal – a recording of my daughter’s last year and a half.  And I’d like that back.

I don’t intend to get you into trouble – though really, you should probably take some time to think about how important it is to you that you break the hearts of young travelers.  Fortunately, her friend wears her clothing size, and they shared – or she’d have been visiting Europe in her pajamas.  All I want is that journal.

You see, I know what it’s like to lose a diary.  Back in March 1988, in New York City, I had a diary stolen, and with it went two and half years of my life.  I was in New York City, visiting my sister and her newborn baby girl with my husband and a close friend.  My parents had come in from Florida and were staying with my sister and her husband, and I was eager to see them all.  As we parked the car, I went to grab my suitcase, but my husband and my friend both told me I was being silly, that no one would see the suitcase, no one would take the suitcase.  They even put a bag of something – peat?  gravel?  – on top of it, to hide it.  I let it go.  When we came down later, the window was broken, the suitcase was gone – and with it, a small stone cat given to me by my sister, that had traveled around the world with me, never a night without it – and my diary.  The next day, in the daylight, I circled the streets, hoping to find the contents of my suitcase dumped, but I never found it.  There was nothing in there of value – clothes were replaced – but not the cat, and certainly not the record of those two and a half years.  Those were some pretty important years. 

Gone was the story of my first anniversary Star Trek convention where I “met” George Takei.  Gone were the many trips to Cape Cod or New Hampshire.  Gone was the middle-of-the-night decision to drive to the shore to see Halley’s Comet.  Gone was my decision to change jobs.  Gone was the heartache of graduate school.  And gone was the week of my baby.

I found out I was pregnant on Tuesday, February 2, 1988.  It wasn’t planned, but I was happy.  I was happier than I thought I would be.  I got the call at work – the test is positive, come in tomorrow for a follow-up test, congratulations.  There was a bit about mycoplasma, I’d need medication to get rid of it or it would complicate the pregnancy, congratulations.  All I really heard was “positive.”  The next day I floated into my doctor’s office for another test, floated to work, grinned and giggled as I rearranged words on my computer screen, kept it close and mine.  I think my husband was happy; I know I was ecstatic. 

On February 4^th, there was a blizzard.  I drove the normally 40-minute commute in 90 minutes, but I didn’t mind because I played the Broadway cast recording to Les Miserables and sang along, my voice aimed at my passenger, and I arrived at my office just in time to pick up the phone.  It was my doctor.  The test read that my pregnancy was failing, hormones going down, could be any time.  In a sudden daze, I went into my supervisor’s office and left her a note:  Going home.  Having a miscarriage.  And I left.

It was another 90 minute drive home, but this time in silence.  This time I had to concentrate.  This time, there were cars off the road but I hardly noticed them.  This time, I drove alone.

To be honest, I don’t remember how I told my husband.  Did I call him from work?  Did I call him when I got home?  Did I wait for him to get home?  The only phone call I remember was to my mother, and I half wonder if it’s too painful to share with you, stranger from France, but I will.  I called my mother.  I cried, something I did rarely.  I told her what was happening.  The phone beeped – she was getting another call.  She put me on hold.  When she came back, she told me it was my sister calling her – could she call me back later?  I don’t remember what I said.

The storm continued to rage outside.  How the evening passed, I don’t know, but it was bedtime and I had to remove my contact lenses.  Only, one of them wouldn’t come out.  It was stuck on my eyeball.  My husband tried; I tried again and again.  I flushed my eye with water – cold water, warm water, cold water again.  Eventually, I had to call my doctor:  what do I do?

And then we were on the road, headed for the Massachusetts Eye Hospital.  In my hurry to leave, I forgot to bring a hat, scarf, or gloves.  The parking lot, covered with snow, was across the highway from the hospital, and we had to cross a pedestrian bridge.  I was cold.  I was sad.  I was in pain.  And then I realized, as I walked, that I wasn’t just in pain in my eye, but I was beginning to cramp.  I was losing the pregnancy.

Well, the emergency room doctor got the contact lens off my eye with a teeny tiny suction cup, which he presented to me and which I still have (and use – and God forbid I should ever lose it!).  My husband took me home.  It had been one of the worst days of my life.  I thought about how, forever, February 4^th would be the anniversary of something awful, something unforgettable – that the following year, I would grieve, and for every year after that, February 4^th, a black day for the rest of my life.

And a month later, all of this was stolen from me.  Of course, as you can see, it wasn’t really stolen from me, but for months I felt the loss of those words, written in my diary.  There I was, a short month later, gazing at my new niece, amazed at how her digestive system seemed to work, awed at how she had already changed my sister, sad and empty and alone in my grief.  I never told my family about the theft.  The following day, we went out to buy some clothes to last through the visit.  I bought a new diary and got back to my daily writing – only I never packed it to go away with me again.

I don’t believe my daughter has anything quite so dramatic in her journal, Frenchman, but her life is hers, and her words are hers, and I want her to have them back.  If you find yourself reading this, and you still have the journal, please return it.  No questions asked.  Carolyn Kintisch, Webster NY.

Oh, and you know what?  On February 4^th, 1989, I wasn’t thinking about my miscarriage.  I was holding a newborn, a little boy with Down syndrome born a day earlier, and that’s what mattered to me.  All the rest was just stuff.

My stuff.