This post is very sad.
Brownie has been with Sebby from the beginning, the very beginning. He has been lost and found so many times I can't even keep track. He has been everywhere with us. He is the best monkey.
Seb drew this right before we left on our trip
In San Francisco, we left him at a playground. (The one in the picture above---perhaps in that very tunnel. I can't look at this picture without getting teary.) We were two hours south before we realized it. We weren't planning to even go back through the city on our way home, but I kept imagining Brownie lying there, waiting for Seb. I couldn't handle it. The next morning, I asked Sam to take us back, and he (good patient man that he is) agreed, though with little hope. Seb didn't seem that worried, even though we told him Brownie was probably gone. I felt in my heart we'd find him too. But we ran back into the fenced playground; rustled through every bush, rummaged through every garbage can, prayed. Brownie wasn't anywhere. Finally I couldn't justify looking any longer.
That night, driving into the dark towards home, crossing the Bay Bridge, it hit Sebby for real. "Brownie! Can we go back?" he sobbed. I thought his heart was breaking. He crawled up to my seat and I sobbed with him; his face in my shoulder, my tears in his hair.
I know. It's silly. Of course we'll get over it. We do have Brownie Two (as Sam keeps telling me, when the starter goes down, it just means someone else gets more playing time). Seb's fine. I'm not quite fine, yet, though. I miss that little Brownie, and who he was to my Sebby boy. I don't like thinking of him all alone in San Francisco somewhere. I don't like sad endings.
It's amazing how some of our children latch onto something that kind of symbolizes them and their childhood, and when it is lost or they lose interest in it, the growing up time of life hits us hard, and it's like something or someone died. I am very sad for Brownie and I shed tears at this tender post. Thanks for sharing MarN.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, did you ever participate in a recitation of the following with me?
"San-Nanny-Fran-Nanny-Sissy-Sissy-Co"
I don't know why this always pops into my head when I read the name San Francisco, but it does. Very obnoxious. It looks like you had an incredible trip! You two are my heroes with your traveling brood. My lunches never look anything like yours. Maybe i would like picnicking better if we had food like that.
I understand this completely. And what Rachael said? Yes. That, too. Once, Gin dumped an entire roll of pictures of baby Max out of her car by accident in her gym parking lot - it was freezing and before dawn when she did it. Later, she found a few tattered photos in that place and realized what she'd done. She was inconsolable.
ReplyDeleteThat is heartbreaking!
ReplyDelete