Patchwork Puppy Blues

I'm lying in bed tonight with a bit of a stomach ache, a little bit of a headache and a bit more of a heartache.  A loss.  A ridiculous longing for a stuffed animal that went missing nearly two years ago.  Every time I get sick I look for it.  I keep thinking I must have missed a random corner here... perhaps I left it in Idyllwild... but every search is for naught.  I look every time I visit and so far no traces have been found.  I have no idea of what could have happened to my old comfort, it's not like it ever went out to the theatre or out clubbing to be forgotten in some dark corner or picked up by some shady character just hoping to sell a stuffed dog on ebay...

Oh dear old puppy, I had you when I was ever so small.  I had you whenever I was ill, I even had my mother fly you from California to my hospital bed in Ohio when I was scary-sick in college... You had the perfect place for my head on your cool back, and I could wrap my right arm around your head to rub your ear between my thumbs... such comfort and now, alas, whenever I am sick all I can think of is how you've vanished into the ether... now I am sick, and sad.   It's odd to feel so lonely for lack of an inanimate object.

Puppy come home!