CROSBY — Our first lost person was a husband. His wife had lost him somewhere around the tractor display and she could not find him after two hours of looking.

The OPP located him and contacted our volunteer team. We called that incident our trial run.

Little did we know that many wives would lose their husbands throughout the five days in September at the International Plowing Match. Did the husbands get lost intentionally, we wondered? One wife told us not to call her husband over the public address system because he would be too embarrassed. But where was he?

Missing people is just one of the pitfalls at an event where almost 90,000 people gather over five days. One year, 98 people were reported missing at an IPM. At this year’s IPM, 25 people, mostly children, were reported missing.

Every day, some ‘lost’ teenagers were reported late for the bus. Had they lost track of time? Yes. Did they have a watch? Oh, yes.

Things became more serious when we were called about a missing five-year-old. Her description went to the OPP immediately. Almost instantly, we were relieved to report that one of the site volunteers had taken the child to one of our comfort stations. A sigh of relief could be heard on the two-way radios. Our bus greeters had done a great job of instructing the children that, if they got lost, to go to one of the IPM gold vest volunteers. That little girl had listened well.

As I was having an early lunch, a description of a lost child came on the radio. I wrote down the details and as I was looking around, there was the lost child! He had made his way back to the bus entrance and was going to make sure his bus did not leave without him.

On Thursday afternoon, taxiing people to the exits after closing time, I had turned off my radio. The education team chairperson was trying to locate me and decided I must be lost too. The joke lasted for the rest of the week.

On Saturday, the last day, all of our family, including three grandchildren, attended the plowing match.

Our daughter showed up at one of the comfort stations and told a volunteer that she had lost her mother. She gave my description and my name. On the two-way radio comes the message that I’m missing again.

When the gates closed, we were relieved because all of our lost children and mothers and husbands and wives had been found safe and sound.

Most volunteers had been functioning on a few hours of sleep a night. Our minds could not shut down. The adrenaline was going full blast. What a lot of fun!