What are the Odds?!

Earlier this week and out of the blue, Sara and Jeff received a call from an acquaintance - a woman named Joy, who once taught 4th grade at the same elementary school as Jeff and now works in the same school district as Sara - who asked them a peculiar question.

A few days ago, while Joy and her husband helped friends of theirs search for salvageable belongings under what was left of the friends' home, her husband came across a padlock with a few keys and a class ring locked on it. The class ring, which read "Elmwood High School" on one side and "Class of 1996" on the other, didn't belong to either homeowner so Joy suggested her husband post a picture of the ring on the Washington Illinois Tornado Recovery Facebook page in hopes that word of the ring's discovery would travel back to the owner.

That evening, before her husband posted a picture to Facebook, Joy took one more look at the ring and noticed the name "Jeff" inscribed on one side. At the time she didn't think much of that detail, and went to bed.

That's Jeff, 2nd from the right, Elmwood HS Class of 1996.

During the night, "Jeff Ekena, Elmwood High School Class of 1996" came to Joy in a dream. She woke the following morning knowing exactly who the ring belonged to.

Joy called Jeff and asked that peculiar question: "I know this sounds strange, but did you have an Elmwood High School class of 1996 ring locked onto a padlock?", to which Jeff replied that he did.

Next week the ring - and the padlock - will be returned to its owner. Just one more small discovery for which to be thankful.

And yes, I agree with you - it's weird to store your class ring on a padlock. Apparently that's where Jeff put it for "safe-keeping". I'd mock him if his strategy hadn't worked as well as it did...