News and Insights

Have You Seen My Watch?

October 17, 2022

Last Tuesday evening, after coming home from work, I went upstairs to my son’s bedroom to ask about his day. Immediately upon opening his door, I could tell that he was upset about something. He told me that someone had stolen his Apple Watch. Although, when I probed a bit further, he shared that it fell out of his bag at the park the day earlier and when he went back to look for it that day, it was gone. But his “find my ” app shared that it was now at someone else’s house.

I told him that someone probably just found it (not stole it), picked it up and took it home – and that we should just head over and ask them. He was certain that was a bad idea, but we agreed to go there the next day (as long as I did all the talking).

Upon arriving at the home, we rang the doorbell and an elderly man answered the door. My son looked at me as though we were crazy. I explained to the man that my son lost his watch at the park, and his phone indicated that it may be here. The man replied with a big smile on his face, by telling us about his morning exercise routine at the park, and that he indeed had the watch. He went inside, got the watch and handed it to Josh. Mission accomplished.

Aside from just wanting to share this fun story with you, I thought it worthwhile to highlight some of the lessons that came with it (for my son and others):

Avoid climbing the inference ladder. When we are upset about something, it is easy to jump to conclusions and place blame on others. His watch was not stolen. It was found.
Rest assured that there’s much humanity in the world. Contrary to my recent post about our AirBnB experience, this experience helped restore my faith in humanity. There are lots of really good people out there.
Don’t be afraid to ask. As I’ve been told many times, if you don’t ask, you probably won’t get. So, as difficult as it may be to do so, just ask.
Mind the gap. As noted, my son didn’t lose his watch. It just fell out of a large hole in his backpack. If you have holes in your bags or pockets, either fix them or don’t expect things to stay in them.
Trust Apple locations. I’m still a bit amazed at the accuracy of Apple’s find my device service. The house we visited was a 2-family house, and Apple even directed us to the correct door.

I hope that this post made you smile as much as the actual incident made me and my son smile. And to the kind man who found Josh’s watch, thank you!

POSTED BY: Jeff Freedman