Last spring I was at Ikea shopping for a new duvet cover. M2 was in the cart with me, and she was whining about being stuck in the cart. I grabbed a stuffed cat off a display shelf and handed it to her as a distraction. As we neared the end of our shopping I noticed she had been chewing on the ears and tail of the cat, and it was quite soggy. I didn't feel right about putting it back, so we bought it for $7.99. As it would turn out, that grey cat would become "the" stuffed animal. M2 has dozens of stuffed animals, but that cat was by far her favorite and cherished friend.
She loved that thing, calling him her "meow." She would carry him around all day by the neck, and nap time and bedtime required that her Meow be by her side. When I would greet her at her crib in the morning she would be holding him and would not allow me to pick her up until he was in hand. Mr.P and I joked about how we should go back to Ikea and buy a few cats to have on hand in case anything were to happen to Meow. Last month I was at Ikea picking up a new shower curtain and I stopped by the Ikea Jr department, casually in search of a backup cat. I couldn't find them, though I didn't look too hard and left without giving it much thought. After all, we've managed to make it nearly a year without anything happening to Meow. Until last weekend.
We flew out of state to visit my family for the weekend. Upon exiting the secured area we met up with my mom in the waiting lounge and stopped for a few minutes so I could feed P5 who hadn't eaten in 3 hours. As I was breastfeeding him and chatting with my mom, M2 was running around the lounge area with Meow while Mr.P kept an eye on her. With the distraction of feeding the baby, rounding up our luggage and installing the car seats in the car I failed to notice we did not have Meow with us. Later, at my mom's house we realized his absence. We searched all our bags and the car, but Meow was gone. Next step was to call the airport lost and found which reported that no grey cat had been turned in. I insisted Mr.P drive out to the airport (a 30 minute drive) to search for himself. He and my brother in-law drove out there, but came up empty handed. Meow was gone.
We checked back with the lost and found when we arrived at the airport to fly home, but there was still no sign of Meow. The next day I packed up the kids in the car, and we journeyed 45 minutes to Ikea. I searched the store but there was not a grey cat to be found. I talked to a salesperson and found that item had been discontinued over a year ago, and the fact that I bought one last spring was a miracle since it was the last one being used on a display. We left the store empty handed (well, not quite. We did buy a stuffed bunny and a small table and chairs set). I set out to search the Internet and in my research I found several tales of woe of lost Ikea animals that people (much like me) were desperate to replace. I located a cat just like Meow on eBay, brand new with tags still attached. All week I've been telling M2 that Meow is "on vacation" and will be back soon. When he arrives in the mail, I plan to cut the tags off and wash him so that he'll at least smell like our detergent (I had been washing Meow about once a week up until he was lost). Hopefully the new one will be just as loved as the old one, and this time we will be much more careful to keep tabs on Meow when we are out of the house.
No comments:
Post a Comment