My Lost Toy Story

**NOTE: This was written on 13th August. I told you I was playing catch-up...**

Oh gods, I have guilt. The most unbearable, earth-shattering, bone-crunching guilt, weighing down on me like a suit of armour. I thought I'd dealt with the trauma, but it took a trip to the cinema to make me realise that, actually, guilt of this proportion never, ever leaves you...

The reason for my current, crushing guilt is that I've just got back from seeing Toy Story 3. Unlike many of the grown men in the audience, I did not quietly sob my way through the film; I didn't even loudly sob, although I will confess to a slight lump in the throat as the film unfolded, but the sudden wave of guilt that crashed over me as I sat in the darkness was stifling. I, too, was like Andy once, young and carefree and completely obsessed with my favourite toys. I loved my Lego and my Fisher Price People; I cuddled my Doggy Wheels and had my Fisher Price Chatterphone that I was quite attached to; but the two toys that I worshipped and adored above and beyond any other were two cuddly toys. One was a pink and white mouse that I received from Father Christmas at playgroup when I was three, and who still regards me with the same curious and compassionate expression at twenty-eight as he did at three. I will never, ever give up my Pinkie, not for anyone; not even if Paul O'Connell, Jenson Button, Paul Collingwood, David Beckham, Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Eddie Izzard, David Tennant, all of Apocalyptica and Till Lindemann himself (more about my bizarre and varied crushes later, I feel) turned up on my doorstep all at once and begged for my hand in marriage, complete with drawn-up rota for how they'd share my time (and the chores) on the condition that the mouse goes. Sorry, fellas, not even the combined pull of your obvious and varied charms could ever persuade me to completely rid myself of my faithful Pinkie. And the reason for this faintly ludicrous attachment to a pink and white stuffed mouse is also the reason for the wave of utter shame and culpability that swept over me in the cinema: I have lost a beloved toy and, to this day, remain utterly ignorant of his whereabouts. I want to die at the thought.

His name was Coco. He was a knitted clown that was presented to me when I was born; so young was I that I don't even remember the very first time we were introduced, but from the very moment that he was placed into my crib, we were inseperable. Coco and I went everywhere together, did everything together...he was my best friend, my confidante and my constant companion; when I cried, he was there, when I laughed, he got the joke. He was my world and I knew we'd always be together.

Alas, like all first loves, it was not to be. At the age of seven, my parents divorced and we moved in with my maternal grandparents. Pinkie was definitely there but, to this day, I can't be sure whether Coco was. I don't know what's worse, the fact that I lost him or the fact that I can't remember when and where I lost him. All I know is that one day he was there and the next, he was gone. Did I give him to someone, in the mistaken belief that I was too old for such things? Had I left him somewhere, abandoning him to the cruel fate of the 'lost toy'? Having seen Toy Story 3, I now have a terrible sense of guilt that, wherever he is, Coco feels that I callously tossed him aside. I can only hope that he ended up somewhere nice, with a child who loved him as much as I did and who wouldn't be so cruel as to just lose him.

I still have my Pinkie, and I still have one picture of me with Coco, but the actual object of my first ever love has been lost to the travels and travails of growing up. I can only hope that wherever he is, Coco is happy and knows that, while we were together, he was the best thing that had ever happened to me.

And I'll never watch bloody Toy Story again without feeling that awful knot in the pit of my stomach...thanks, Pixar!

On green fingers and a return to innocence...

I think it’s fair to say that I’m an enthusiastic rather than a knowledgeable gardener. As a child, I loved nothing more than ‘helping’ my grandparents in their respective gardens; my Nanna (my dad’s mum) grew flowers and my Grandad (my mum’s dad) had an allotment, a small vegetable patch, a greenhouse and a large garden with lots of flowers in, and so from a very early age I was running around with my little plastic watering can, enthusiastically soaking everything and everyone in sight. Fast forward twenty-five years or so and I’m still running around with my little watering can, enthusiastically soaking everything and everyone in sight…

Unlike my grandparents, I don’t really have ‘the knack’ when it comes to knowing what’s what in the garden. My Grandad was the fount of all knowledge when it came to horticultural matters, and my childish questions about why roses smelt and why tomatoes changed colour were always answered very seriously and gently, in a way that only a grandfather can. Similarly, my pleas to ‘help’ were always gratefully received; as a child, I was never happier than when I was with my Grandad on his allotment, rooting around in the mud and digging up potatoes with my bare hands and trying to cram as many peas and strawberries into my mouth as I could before I was caught out. As I grew older, my poor Grandad become subject to my ever-increasing demands on both his time and his soil; after my Nanna’s death when I was 10, for example, I wanted a pot with some dirt in it so I could grow sweet peas in her memory. Some of my happiest memories were of me trundling round the garden with her, helping to water the sweet peas that she grew; my Grandad’s response to this request was to turn over an entire patch of his precious garden to my experiment at growing my own sweet peas, something that he’d never grown. The sweet peas were not entirely successful, it has to be said, and the fact they grew at all owed more to my Grandad’s skills than my own, but the seeds of something far more important than a bunch of pretty flowers were sown that day and I was almost beside myself with joy at the accomplishment.

When my Grandad died when I was 14, and we moved into a house that only had a small garden, I lost my enthusiasm for gardening. I think it was a combination of teenage rebellion, grief at losing my Grandad and not having the space to do much garden-wise, but whatever it was I wasn’t interested in making things grow. As the years passed, I had a few brief forays into reigniting my love of all things green-fingered, but mostly they were completely unsuccessful; I must be the only person on the planet to kill a bamboo plant, for example. Demoralised and convinced that I was utterly useless without my Grandad’s gentle reminders to water things/not over-water things, I gave up and resigned myself to a life of vases of cut flowers and living vicariously through the achievements of others.

Recently, however, I have staged a breakthrough. It started innocuously enough, when the Innocent smoothie I bought came with a packet of ‘bee friendly’ seeds; I like bees a lot and firmly believe anything that can be done to help boost their numbers is a Good Thing, so I begged a pot of soil from my mother (sounds familiar) and planted my seeds. I watered them diligently every evening and, to my eternal joy and amazement, three days later my first green seedlings appeared. From my reaction, you’d have thought I’d just grown some rare and exotic specimen that had won first prize at the Chelsea Flower Show, but I was so overjoyed that a) I hadn’t killed them and b) they were actually, properly growing that I think my complete overreaction was justified.

From such tiny plantlets mighty plans do grow…my enthusiasm for all things green-fingered has at last been reignited. I watch my mystery green seedlings obsessively, monitoring their wellbeing as though they were infants in a Special Care Baby Unit, and progress updates are given proudly each evening to The Parents. (They humour me…they know me well). I have also recently sown some sweet peas in memory of my Nanna, and nearly deafened the neighbours with my shrieks of demented joy yesterday evening when I discovered that they have germinated and produced a few green shoots. All of this encouraging progress has given me the confidence to voice a secret desire that I have long nurtured: I am going to get myself an allotment and grow veg on it, just as my beloved Grandad always did. Amazingly, The Parents are supportive of this venture, and so tentative enquiries are being made about acquiring said allotment. Plans are also afoot to write a separate blog chronicling the trials, triumphs and tragedies of the allotment once I have taken possession of it, but that’s all in the future. For now, I am nurturing a pot of sweet peas and a pot of mystery flowers and am ludicrously proud of my abilities thus far...

Grandad would be proud, I think. And be reminding me not to over/under water them. Now where did I put that watering can…?