My Blanket And Me

• So, as I was unpacking/repacking after arriving home from Korea, I realized a terrible terrible thing - I had left my Blankie at the hostel we stayed in. This may not sound that awful. But it really is. I've had my yellow Blankie since Erin was born - that would be 22 years. In middle school, my mom tried to get me to use a new one, because the original was getting old and not yellow. But that one is packed away somewhere, and looks good as new. Over the last 10 years, I've left my Blankie many places - home as I was headed to camp, MSU, NYC, Royal Oak - but it was always with someone who could send it back to me. If I left it somewhere that was within driving distance, I drove back to go get it. This time, despite my efforts to contact the hostel (and their efforts to look for it), it hasn't been found. I'm actually tearing up a little writing this. My Blankie has gone with me everywhere and was a big comfort when I climbed into my bed every night. It smelled good (despite what other people said) and it was amazing, since it had tangled itself into an undoable knot over the years. I know it's silly, but I feel like something close to me has died. And the fact that this happened at a time when so much in my life is changing makes it worse. The terrible symbolism here is that this loss of my childhood comfort came right before I was offered my first Big Girl job. Right as I was applying for a car loan, looking for an apartment, having bills transferred to be paid in my name. This is when I could use a snuggle with my Blankie the most and instead I'm faced with the idea that this is an archetype of my childhood ending and my actual adulthood beginning. I know going into adulthood doesn't make you an adult (*cough cough* Linda and George). And this is clear when I want, more than a lot of other things right now, to have my Blankie back so I can hold it as I fall off to sleep before my first day at my real job.