"Man" Looking

It has become increasingly obvious to me that among the myriad of other things mothers are blessed with, giving birth to a child also brings with it the miraculous ability to locate things in the house. Not just my things, but other people's things. At least that's what my family thinks. "Mom, have you seen my Leapster? I can't find it anywhere!" Except on the floor in the dining room, where she left it yesterday. At 6:45 AM on a school morning: "Where is my shirt? You know, the one with the ballerina on it?" The one that she hasn't worn since last fall. "Where is my brown horse? I can't SLEEP without it!" This would be the same brown horse she hasn't seen in six months. Where is it written that mom knows where every single item in our house is at any given moment?
And I've only mentioned the kids so far. My husband is convinced that I have the supernatural ability to locate things as well. My sweet, adorable, wonderful husband likes to do what I call "man" looking. Man looking for an item involves a casual scan of the room, not including under or behind other items. And it definitely does not include places like in between the couch cushions or under the TV. If you tell him an item is in a drawer, he will walk to said drawer, open it, quickly scan the items on top and announce, "It's not in here!" At least 95% of the time, I know that the item is in fact in that drawer, because I put it there. So in the kindest possible way I'll say, "Did you really look, or did you man look?" And most of the time he'll tell the truth. "No, I man looked!" At which point I will walk into the room, open the drawer, lift two or three things up, so as to see what's underneath them, and pull out the aforementioned item. Of course, this only reinforces the idea that mom knows where everything is at all times, so I don't really think I'm doing myself any favors. It's a vicious cycle.
Yesterday, however, we were getting ready to go somewhere and no one could locate baby's tennis shoes. My husband, my kids and I had all looked all over the house and they were nowhere to be found. My big girls decided that they must have fallen victim to "Mr. Nobody," who is responsible for all the things that go wrong around here, as well as lost toys. I told them I was pretty sure "mom brain" had more to do with this than Mr. Nobody, but they weren't convinced. We located a suitable replacement and off we went.
Just before we got ready to go to bed last night, I headed to the laundry room to put that last load in the washer. As I turned to leave the room, I spotted them. The baby's tennis shoes, sitting right there on the shoe rack with all the other shoes. Well, what do you know? It happens to moms, too. Okay, fine, here you go, get ready for it: I admit it. I man looked.