At least, I THINK it was a caterpillar. It came from the exclusive emporium of WalMart. It was bilious pink with knobby things all up and down its length. It had yellow feet, a head sporting a smile with very white teeth, yellow ears, and squeakies in both ends. Amber loved it.
It lived to go through the wash twice. Amber got one squeaky out, but the other one was still in.
Amber was here in the office with me. She moved from one toy to the next and then came through my legs to get to the bed under the counter, and then out again, over and over. She then got quiet.
I should have known that wasn’t good, but I was so happy she had settled for a bit that I didn’t pay enough attention. The next time I looked, the pink caterpillar had lost about half of its length in bits and pieces all over the carpet. I spent the next minutes with the whisk broom, trying to gather the shreds, threads, and balls of pink ‘stuff’ that used to be a toy. I have now disposed of the caterpillar (thank goodness the squeaky is NOT inside Amber!).
Amber won a trip out to the back porch so that I could clean things up. The threads were everywhere. I used a whisk broom, the vacuum cleaner, the whisk broom again, and the vacuum again before things were good again.
I don’t think Amber learned any lessons from this, but “I” did. I’ve learned to pay better attention when the soft toys start getting raggedy.
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