In a rather thorough room cleaning recently, I ended up poking in places I haven’t poked in years. That included behind a heating unit in the corner, where it turns out several pieces of paper had slipped down over time.

I found a few different things – a year-old birthday card I’d forgotten about, a printed picture, a dollar bill. The most interesting find, however, was definitely not mine. It was a couple of photos, taped together, along with an envelope with the same address as the house but with a different name. I can only assume the photos were lost and left behind by whoever lived in the room last. It wasn’t exactly in an easy-to-reach place. It makes me wonder if the person who left it knew it was there to leave. Everyone, at some point in their life, has had at least one thing where they swear they had it just the other day – they only put it down for a second, no, really, where did it go – until suddenly, it’s been five years and they still haven’t found it. Mine was a doll in a blue dress, and I still catch myself thinking that if I go through the closet just one more time, I’ll find it in the back.

But there really are so many more times when something that was significant slips off a shelf or the back of a dresser, tucks itself into a handy nook and completely vanishes from living memory.

And there’s only so long a person really has to go looking for something before they lose the opportunity.

I only remember moving once in my life, and the day of the actual relocation itself was somewhat frantic. In hindsight, it seems ridiculous, given that the packing had taken weeks already – weeks of loading up boxes with books and wrapping plates in newspaper and complaining about packing. But on the day of, we were still running around the house trying to track down anything that might have been forgotten. There was a lot of loose change lying around that I scooped up, but I don’t remember how carefully I checked in the back of the closet or along the baseboards.

I wonder if the person who had my old room after me ever went looking in drawers and ended up digging out some forgotten piece of paper that once meant something to me.

I wonder what the person who will eventually live in the room I have today is going to find someday.

— Nina Collay is a junior at Thornton Academy.