On Saturday evening, May 23rd, I received the following text message.
“Hi Dennis! I was directed to you on facebook as I had posted about losing my engagement ring in my backyard today. I tried a metal detector to see if I could find it but no luck! I was wondering if you might be able to help. I’m in the Town of Scarborough, Maine.”
I replied by calling the number back, rather than keep texting. It moves things along much faster and it now being after 6:00pm, I would like to search while there was still some light. Isabelle told me that eariler in the afternoon,she had some family and friends over and were enjoying the day, out in the ”small” backyard. Isabelle has a young daughter and the daughter was having a blast, running all over the place. Isabelle would chase her down and bring her back where everyone else was. The 2-3 year old also played on the swing set ans was having the time of her life. As the afternoon passed Isabelle noticed her engagement ring was missing. She knew she had it on earlier because she had showed it to some of the family and friends. Isabelle figured the engagement ring came off, while rounding up her daughter. Isabelle posted a Facebook story and someoe let her borrow their metal detector. Isabelle and her father searched for the engagement ring, without any success. They had never used a metal detector before and all the beeps and chirps were overwhelming for them. That’s when some people on Facebook had told her to contact me. Isabelle asked if I could come over in the morning, Sunday, but I was already booked in Sanford, for 7:00am. It was scheduled to rain later Sunday and I was also leaving at 4:00pm, to attend a concert, in Boston. When Isabelle had given me her address, I knew it was only 7-8 miles from my house. I told her I would be right there and search tonight, as I had maybe an hour and a half hours of daylight left. So I packed up my equiptment and headed to Scarborough.
Once I arrived, Isabelle and her father showed me the backyard. It was small and I was estimating I could cover the entire area, in approximately 30 minutes. There was quite a bit of metal, in the yard, that had to be moved but not to bad. I am a creature of habit and I always like to pefor a grid search and this search would start at the house and I would work my way down towards the swing set, moving metal items as I went along. The search was procedeing nicely but the engagement ring remained elusive as I approached the halfway point, in the yard. Still plenty of real estate to check. As I was approaching the swing set, at the end of the yard, before a slight drop off in the yard, I still hadn’t found the ring. Before I went down the slope, Isabelle’s father asked her if she had gone down there. She replied she had, on multiple occasions, while trying to corral her young daughter. Ok, I started behing the swing set and started searching the dropoff. As I approached the garage I realized I was running out of room to search. Maybe another 5 minutes and I would have covered the entire yard. Then what? As I ws thinking about my next move and what questions, I could ask Isabelle, I received the signal I had been hoping for. A loud, repeatable low tone, coming from the grass. As I was pulling my pinpointer out, I saw the ring, in the grass. I bent down picked it up, I heard her father say, “No Way.” I then looked at Isabelle, showed her the ring, saying “Is that it?” A very happy smiling Isabelle replied, ”Yeah, That’s it, Thank you.”. Always, always a fantastic feeling to show the owner their ring, that had been lost. Isaabelle immediately put the engagement ring on her finger, admiring the ring, once again.
Another ring back on the finger and I’ll say it again, “We have the best job in the world. I love my job. If it matters to you, it matters to us💍😀❤️🙏
No Comments »