The lost boy was found and in good condition after spending 24 hours alone in the Sullivan County woods.Back when I first met my future wife, she took me along on a family trip down to the beach at Narragansett, and her five-year-old nephew walked away from us while everybody was busy packing our things to go. Freakout from all and sundry, with the exception of yours truly who put on his serene face and calmly scanned the water's edge. Oh, there he is. Yay, I'm a hero - extra clam fritters for me!
The standard advice when finding a lost item is to remain serene, but a child isn't a set of car keys and summoning the inner Mariano Rivera is a whole lot tougher when it's your own kid. It didn't help the anxiety any that the kid who went walkabout shares a name with our very own Beast, and that we were headed to a cookout in Westchester yesterday. Where there was a pond in the back yard. Just a small ornamental pond, but still. Set our heads on perma-swivel, just in case. All is well.
