I don’t lose things. I don’t leave my cell phone on store counters, I don’t misplace my keys, and I certainly don’t lose my driver license. But now it seemed to have happened.

It was annoying but eventually led to a glorious realization.

Fulltime traditional jobs weren’t coming to fruition, a vandal drizzled chocolate syrup on the windshield of my car, my cat Saffron found a little brown bat on the balcony and brought it into my bed as a plaything. Several rabies shots and mandatory emergency room visits later, I was looking at debt for the first time in my life because also for the first time in my life I lacked health insurance.

I bemoaned these events and more to my friend Randy, my step-mother Susan, and my aunt Cara who, despite their different religious leanings, all confidently told me this was part of a test from above. “But I’m failing the test,” I said.

I wasn’t happy but I nonetheless cheerfully went to celebrate my friend and colleague Greg’s departure to a new job. I ordered a drink at the bar, handed my ID to the bartender when asked, then slipped the card back into my small sparkly black purse. The next morning, I was switching my purses and opened my wallet.

No driver license.

I searched my car like a madwoman, methodically retraced my steps at the restaurant, and called the manager more than once. “Did you find a driver license? Did you find a driver license??”

By itself, misplacing the license wasn’t a tragedy. But too much bad luck had been happening. Now, I was overwhelmed. I pulled my car into a coffee shop parking lot near the mall I had just combed for signs of my license and let out a blood curdling scream. Why had the universe stopped blessing me? Who was I?

I began to talk to people about the concept of identity and ended up writing an essay for a national magazine.

I interviewed Rabbi Samuel Cohon. He said it doesn’t matter to a higher power if a person loses something that forms his or her sense of self. He says, “God still cares. You are still holy. Someone is still the same person.” Rabbi Cohon notes there’s comfort in the knowledge we’re all a reflection of a divine image and, yes, we all matter to God.

Psychic counselor Gigi Sample made similar comments. The universe has unconditional love and wants to help. She says, “The universe sets up situations to show us who we really are. People are not their money, not their body.” Think more positive and more positive will come.

One night not long after those interviews, I was cleaning my apartment and I yanked back a kitchen table chair, pushing the vacuum in its spot. I stopped in mid push. Something was on the chair. I leaned forward and plucked a shiny plastic card from its quiet hidden spot.

My missing driver license.

I hadn’t lost my ID after all. It had been with me everyday for weeks. It hadn’t gone anywhere and the universe certainly hadn’t taken it from me.

Randy, Susan, and Cara might be correct. Much of what I had been experiencing over several months was a test to make sure I was ready and worthy of the good stuff ahead.

It’s also true what Rabbi Cohon and Gigi told me. The universe gives us tools and gifts to forge our own paths and make our own magic.

Time to make magic.