Our menagerie

When Ella was a week old, our dear friend Kevin brought her a stuffed turtle.  He told us when he was a kid, he received many, many turtles: in Chinese tradition, turtles are a symbol of longevity. The turtle spent a lot of time in the crib with Ella, along with some other assorted stuffed animals.  But when Ella was fifteen months old, all of the sudden, she and Turtle were inseparable.  Turtle came with us to the beach, the playground, the Berkeley campus.  And further afield, to Cleveland, Texas, and Florida. I forgot to take her on a visit to Virginia, and Dennis ended up sending her FedEx.

When Ella was two her turtle acquired a name: Jane.  And then she acquired a few other names. For five years, now, she's been known as Jane Turtle Ice Cube Ella.  But usually she's just Jane.

Turtle's been lost more times than I can count.  We lost her in Oakland's Fairyland, and tromped across the park for a half-hour before finding her under a bush.  We lost her at a Point Isabel dog park and found her several hours later, on a picnic table, covered with drool.  We've lost her at playgrounds and stores more times than I can count.  But she has that certain well-loved appearance that makes other children dismiss her and encourages parents to set her in a safe place for hopeful retrieval.

Ella and Jane, each at fifteen months

All the same, after a few months of losing and finding Jane, we began to think that maybe having an extra turtle might just be a good thing.  Kind Uncle Kevin helped us out, but  Ella knew every loose thread, every chip on the plastic eyes, every dirt smudge on her beloved Jane.  She knew something was up...and eventually she caught us out.  We messed up and left the backup out, and Ella claimed her as second love.  And, ridiculously, named her Backup Turtle.

The problem was, now Ella had two turtles to love, and lug, and while Jane is her one true love, she'd sorely miss old Backup, too.  We doubled our problems and responsibilities quite neatly.

Taken tonight: years later, we still have both turtles,
and both are still on duty, comforting our Ella.

So you'd think we'd learn from our mistakes.

Alex and Marie

When Alex was just shy of two years old, we went to Disney World with my parents, and at EPCOT center, he found a bin of little white stuffed kitties, specifically, Marie from The Aristocats.  He grabbed one and hugged it so cutely that my mom bought Marie for Alex on the spot.  And Alex never let go of Marie.

When it was clear that Marie was The One for Alex, we told my mom, and she bought and mailed an extra for us. And we switched the stuffed animals immediately, hoping to let Alex break in the the other a little. But even those few months were too long: Marie had already acquired that well-loved aura, and Alex wasn't all together sure he believed us when we told him that we'd merely washed his stuffed animal.  "Her paws feel different," he worried. "She doesn't feel the same when I hug her."

Alex and his kitties, tonight

Well, it didn't take us long to lose Marie, good and proper, and so we pulled our backup out of the cupboard, congratulating ourselves on our efficiency and forward-thinking. Until Alex found the other Marie tangled in the bottom of his sheets.  I so wish I had a picture of his face at that moment, but I still remember his smile.  It was what my sister calls a Christmas Morning smile.  "Two of them!" he said, full of awe and wonder.

All the same, there was only one true Marie, and, while Marie is her official name, Alex started calling her, instead, Purple Kitty, because her fur had taken on the greyish-violet tinge of adoration.

My mom, half-helpful, half-amused at our plight, started sending us kitties in droves.  Alex currently owns four Maries and, for good measure, one Figaro.  And he knows about every single one.

And now here we are with Kid Number Three.  For a long time I didn't think he'd have a lovey.  For a while he loved a horse, and for a time there was blanket he liked particularly.  But, spread thin as we are, we're not really attentive enough to help him keep track of any of his dear things.  There's nothing more resilient than a third child, I think.

Meet Monkey!

But on our first trip to the Zurich Zoo, I let each of the kids pick out a souvenir. Ella chose her peacock feather and Alex got a little frog with magnets sewn into it's feet.  Joey stared into the same bin of stuffed animals that Alex was examining, and I asked him "Do you like those? Do you like the bird? Do you like the cat?"

"Monkey!"he cried, happily, "Monkey, Monkey, Monkey!" So I got Joey a little stuffed, magnetic monkey, which he promptly wrapped around his wrist and wore as a bracelet.

And he kept on wearing that monkey, very discretely wrapping it around his wrist each morning and clutching it in his hand during the day. Joey decided that Monkey was coming with us to Austria, and managed to keep monkey with him for most of the trip, but, I'm sorry to say, with a few days left, Monkey went missing somewhere in the vortex of the KinderHotel.  Dennis and I did our best to find it, turning the room inside out, looking around the hotel, asking at the front desk twice, but no luck.

Joey and Monkey, tonight

And that would have been the end of Monkey's story, if not for Joey.  A couple of times each day after, he would randomly, abruptly stop whatever he was doing, look at his wrist, and say, oh so sadly, "Monkey."

Like Jane and Marie, I do believe Monkey is The One for our Joey, and so today I took the kids to the zoo after lunch.  Joey feel asleep on the bus ride, and while he was still sleeping, I bought Monkey.  And the less-lucky Backup Monkey, who was quickly relegated to my bag.  First Monkey, however, I wrapped around Joey's wrist, and when he woke up from his nap, it was like they'd never been apart.  Joey grinned, patted his his little friend, and the two of them jumped up and joined Ella and Alex on the climbing ropes.

So. Does anyone want to place a bet on how many monkeys will be hugging Joey's arm at his third birthday party?