I finally found it

What’s the longest you’ve ever “lost” something in your shop?

Every woodworker alive has at some point lost, misplaced, hidden or simply can’t find something they absolutely know they own. I’ve done it dozens of times. It’s usually small – a set of screw extractors, say, or a favorite screwdriver – but not always. In my case, it was a shoebox-size container of miscellaneous sharpening items.

I can even tell you the date I lost it: May 11, 2017. That’s the day I packed it up when we sold our old house and moved to Pennsylvania. It was packed up, moved with tons of other stuff, unpacked and then stashed till I could set up my new shop.

That took a while, as there was framing, drywall, cabinets, office and storage space and a lot more I had to build. Once done, things got moved around to permanent spots. And somewhere along the line, that box of sharpening stuff disappeared. I looked literally years for it, without luck, and ended up replacing most of the items.

But last week while clearing out a drawer that I wanted to use for something different, at the very bottom of the drawer was that box. I have no idea why I would put that in a drawer and not with the rest of my sharpening stuff – I actually having a sharpening cabinet and bench – but there it was.

The drawer is deep so once at the bottom a lot of other stuff ended up on top of the box, hiding it for six years, seven months, two weeks and a handful of days. I’m glad to have it back, but more importantly I’m thrilled to have the mystery solved.