Lost: One broom

How does one family of five go about losing one slightly used, but still perfectly useful, broom?

As I prepared to sweep the kitchen I was perplexed at first to not find the broom in its normal spot in the laundry room. However, I was not dismayed. My daughters' chores yesterday involved sweeping out the bathrooms so it was likely it had gotten left in one of the bathrooms. Sadly this was not the case. I looked in every bedroom, closet, and corner I could find. I was moving from befuddled and perplexed to ticked off. I mean, who is so careless with a broom???

I announced that an exhaustive search was to begin IMMEDIATELY. We looked under couches and chairs (that obviously could not hide a thing such as a broom), and in desperation looked outside of the house. I walked into rooms and looked at the corners from different angles. When I feared the worst, that one of my children had either disassembled the broom, fed it to the dog, or used it as a catapult, I called my husband.

"Please call me back immediately. This is an emergency." my message said.

Ten minutes later he responded.

"Do you know where the broom is? I've looked everywhere."

"Yeah, it's in the van."

Right, because that's where everyone stores their broom, right?

"The van. Why in the van?"

"When I left this morning I had to sweep the snow off," said my darling man.

"Okay, thanks." I am just so relieved to have my broom back. But the next time he makes fun of me for putting my keys in the fridge by accident I'm going to remind him of the moments of panic he caused me over the broom.