The Mystery of the Missing Umbrella Handle

I have the worst luck with umbrellas. They break all the time. I promise you, it’s not anything I do – it’s caused by gale-force winds, or poor manufacture, or freak accidents such as trams stopping suddenly, or other unexplainable incidents.

There was one such unexplainable incident last Thursday night. I swung my bag onto a bar stool and suddenly my umbrella (which had been hanging off one of the handles) went clattering to the floor. I picked it up and stared bemused at it: the handle had snapped off. I looked around, but it was nowhere to be seen.

When my friend returned to our table I pointed out the handleless shaft to her. “I don’t know where it went,” I said to Sapphire.

“I do,” she replied, nodding at the next table, a couple of metres away. There was the handle, lying forlornly under the occupants’ table. I retrieved it sheepishly, and began to photograph the remnants from all angles.

“I’m glad you’re not broken up about it,” Sapphire remarked, amused.

I shrugged philosophically, being used to such occurrences. “It was inevitable,” I answered her. For to everything there is a season … a time to weep, and a time to laugh … a time to keep, and a time to throw away*, a time to get wet and a time to stay dry.

It’s obviously not my time to stay dry. But it’s certainly time to throw away this polka-dotted umbrella.

* From the Bible: Ecclesiastes 3:1,4,6