A Story of Stuffies

My spouse and I are perhaps not the shining examples of adulting. This morning I had to literally call my parents to help me get out of bed. Our furnace had commitment issues last night and my spouse and I (the ones with arthritis) sleep in the basement. My joints froze to the point where I could not move and needed someone to pry me free.

Upstairs, under the heat of some space heaters and an electric heater, I'm also under the watchful gaze of the early Valentines gift I gave to Daryl, a floppy Simba plushy from the 90's. The plush, though now one of Daryl's favorite things, was a failed attempt for me to get them some closure.

Both Daryl and I were odd kids, for one reason or another spending a lot of time with toys as children instead of friends. There was one small distinction: I had an older brother I loved to play with, Daryl had a younger sister they were much more stand offish with. In a way it is easy to see us as Andy in Toy Story. Our toys, all of them were very important to us.

I had a lot of stuffed animals, but one of my favorites was a pound puppy. I was found of its sad, tear-shaped eyes and soft velvety fur. For a month or so, I couldn't find it, and when I asked my parents if they'd seen it, my father said he donated it away, as he hadn't seen me play with it for a while.

I was heart broken, telling him that I had lost it, and had I known where it was I would have been playing with it more often. To prove I was spoiled, both my father and my grandmother got me replacement toys (a lioness and an alligator) to try to make up for my loss, but I was never as fond of them as I was my puppy.

When I met Daryl, they shared a similar story. They had a Simba plushy they'd carried for most of their life, ruining its fur, neck fluff, carrying around by their father's wallet chain like a dog. But one day, whether it be through the constant moving, homelessness, or if simply it was thrown away, they never saw their toy.

We bonded over the loss of our imaginary friends, being unable to say goodbye on our terms, when we were ready to grow up.

As I said, we suck at adulting, and frequent toy aisles, generally for collectables, sometimes so I can geek out over product design, (I have a degree, I might as well use it for something) and sometimes to actually buy toys for children but this is increasingly rare as they both grow up and move away.

Near Christmas we were examining the Target Christmas aisles when we saw the 80's bring backs. Target regularly redoes old toys. We had several of the new-old My Little Pony already. But this particular time they had some Pound Puppies. I got a small one that I felt looked like the one I'd lost, long ago. I felt a cathartic wash fall over me. I was now even more determined to find Daryl a similar Simba.

The live action Lion King had brought out most of the old toys and that had allowed a joke to start. Any stuffed Simba in stores would be pointed to and it would be asked "Is that your Simba?" This was repeated until I found out it actually was causing mild distress, but the period between those two points allowed me to learn a lot about the plush.

To eBay I went and, after a little more questioning I determined that the missing plush was a Simba floppy plush which sells on eBay at around $50. I hovered between buying a really good one and a really bad one (the shape my spouse would have left it in as a kid) and got an okay one.

"It's still not my Simba," Daryl whispered, holding it close when it came. I could have waited until the 14th to have them open the package, but I generally lack the patience for that in gift-giving.

"Yes, well, I'm not a time-traveler," I groaned. "So this will have to do."