This morning, as I entered my 8 a.m. exercise class, I encountered a fiftyish woman who was very upset -- someone had apparently walked off with her car key, which she had left on one of the shelves at the back of the studio. Experienced in handling these sorts of emergencies, I told her that she’s probably placed it on a different shelf, at a different height, in a different part of the room, or perhaps on some surface that had shelf-like properties, but was not in fact a shelf – maybe a window sill? This, I explained was called “wrong vessel syndrome,” and it affected most of us. It was why you put the ice cream in the cabinet instead of in the freezer. The woman was not interested in my enlightening explanations. She was late for work, and unsure whether to head for the showers or to keep looking. I made a quick survey of all surfaces, but found nothing. Might she have left the key in her jacket pocket? Or even in the car? Had she perhaps left the key on a shelf at a prior class, but not before this one? Just then, another middle-aged woman sat down to lace up her sneakers, and plucked the key from the interior of her shoe. Mortified, she handed it back to its owner. “I have absolutely no recollection of picking up that key or putting it in my shoe,” she said. “It doesn’t even look like my car key. I must be losing my mind.”