life can be so cruel

yesterday, between my 10am tour (which ended at 1pm) and my 2pm tour, I went to subway with some of my tour guide co-worker friends. we were talking about one of the newer guides, and how in the past week or so, he had lost someone on a tour. that's right....just drove off and left them somewhere. (luckily another guide came along after them and found them and brought them back to the office.) sitting there, as we were talking about it, my mind couldn't even fathom how you could just leave someone. i stress at every stop we make, because i'm trying to count heads as we leave...making sure everyone is accounted for. i slow down as we round corners, so i can tabulate every helmeted-head that rolls around behind me. i mean - we're not talking about letting someone fall behind....i'm talking about losing a person. i became very vocal in the conversation and said, 'what kind of an idiot just drives off and leaves someone!? you have to always count and re-count and make sure you have everyone!'

well, sign me 'embarassed after my 2pm'. we were 4 blocks from our office....i had a family of 7 with me, and after we talked about the u.s. naval memorial and they all rode around a bit, i said, 'are we all ready to go?' they all said 'yes!' so we started rolling up towards the portrait gallery and over to our office, figuring everyone in the group had accounted for everyone else. when we got to the gallery, i turned as everyone crossed the street, and counted. but i stopped counting at 6. i quickly re-counted...and said, 'we only have 6.' the family looked around, and everyone started to say, 'oh yeah. where is regan?' i quickly rode back down 2 blocks to the memorial, but she was nowhere to be found.

when i got back, johnny (the dad) was on the phone with regan (who, at this point, it should be noted, is a married adult with 2 children), and she had riden off at the naval memorial and when she looked up, we were gone. but luckily, karen (another guide) and her group came rolling up behind regan and took her under their wing - bringing her back to the office.

luckily karen came along. un-luckily, karen was at lunch...when i vocally recounted my feelings of it taking an idiot to lose someone on a tour. luckily, we both laughed about it a lot. un-luckily, i found out the hard way how it really isn't too hard to lose someone in a quick moment. luckily, it all worked out in the end. un-luckily, i'm going to be the newest story around the tour office of 'the idiot guide who lost someone.'

thanks, life. lesson learned.