The Day After

Now alternately called "National Shopping Day" or "Black Friday," depending on one's retail perspective (consumer v. worker, respectively), there has long been a movement afoot to rechristen this day, the Friday after Thanksgiving, "National Buy Nothing Day."  I laud this trend.  I do.  Things have gotten way out of hand with the obligatory gifting, no question.

In my over-cluttered lair, on this day I habitually cast my eye on all the stuff we already have and reflect on how I can most constructively get rid of some of it -- nothing truly useful, like my squeaky rubber rat, of course, but all the outright junk, or things that aren't junk precisely but simply are not used here.  The Goodwill Industries truck is just up the street.

However, I have to say that I have some very fond memories of this day circa 40 years ago, before everything got so crazy and compulsory, and back when department store toy departments were destinations in and of themselves, magic lands taking up whole floors or basements where you could actually play with merchandise before buying it, and all decked out in velvet and sparkles especially for this season.  This was back when toys that required batteries were still somewhat exotic.  Back then, and for years before I was born, this was the day my whole family would go out to window shop together so we could find out what each of the others might like for Chanuka.

From all that comes another story I think I've told before.  The year when I was three I fell in love with a yellow-and-purple paisley printed velveteen stuffed pig at the May Co. toy department.  (I don't even know if May Co. still exists.  It was once a higher end Southern California department store chain.)  Even though I clearly understood the purpose of the day to be window shopping, I cried when I realized the stuffed pig was not coming home with us.  "But he likes me," I wailed.  I was quite sure I would never see him again and grieved for days.

But then I did receive him for Chanuka.  I named him "Alfred" at my sister's insistence (because she knew I would just call him "Piggie," and she was sick of this particular naming convention), and he instantly became my favorite toy for life.  The bright pink felt covering his nose and ears and feet fell apart as I played and played and played with him.  I am not sure what happened to his original wire-coiled purple velvet tail.  His eyes were lost and replaced with pink buttons.  My mother replaced the felt a few times a year, less frequently as we grew older together, stitched up his war wounds, and finally, when he began to disintegrate beyond the skill of her clever needle in my late teens -- his, too, I guess -- she knit him a turtleneck sweater bag of lavender acrylic worsted.

And as you can see, I still have him, and I still love him and all the parts of my childhood still dwelling in his unwashable stuffing 42 years old this year.  And though he sleeps atop my unread books unattended most days, every once in awhile I pick him up and give him a squeeze, maybe even have a little cry with my arms around him just like I did when I was small and he was larger and I would sometimes have a day when all I wanted was to hold onto my oldest friend for dear life.

Comments

[Leslee]

Awww, again! Two days in a row! Your mom was a sweetheart to do that for you. I wish we'd saved Floppy, my stuffed dog - floppy and floppier as the years passed. But I also had an extreme attachment to my pillow, which I had plans to take with me in the event of a fire. Because I thought about things like that.

[BipolarLawyerCook]

This is just so beautiful. An Alfred hug of a post.

[kathy a.]

oh, alfred. such a fine pig.

may co. was the department store for me, too, growing up in so. cal. alas, it has been eaten by macy*s.

[ScriptorSenex]

I had a much-loved glove puppet, made by a neighbour. Not only do I no longer have him but, much worse, I told him all my secrets in bed at night. My big fear is that one of my enemies has got hold of him and will either ransom him or use his secret knowledge to blackmail me.

[em]

That was so lovely. I have a doll named Suzie just like that. She's had several replacement bodies sewed up for her, and even a replacement wig when my family got embarrassed by her wild hair even though I felt that was going too far. I have a blanket I was given at birth too. It's named old furry.

Thank you for reminding me about the sort of love that patches and patches up old dolls. Thank you for reminding me about families window shopping together. Your writing really is beautiful.

[Michelle]

Aw. Warm fuzzies! Sorry I wasn't here to cause you performance anxiety about feeling better last week, but I do hope you're performing well now. Does that make sense? I'm tired. Off to cuddle puppies.

[laurie]

My uncle, the airline pilot, brought me back a kangaroo from Australia. I was two but I insist that I remember the moment that he held it up in front of me (I loved him very, very much and had been jealous of the lei he'd brought back for my aunt, his girlfriend, from Hawaii). I named her Skippy (after the TV show, "Skippy the Bush Kangaroo") and like your Alfred has been loved hard, mended and reupholstered so many times she is unrecognizable. She lives in my closet and I will never give her up. She has been mine for more than 40 years. My aunt and uncle both died of cancer within a few months of each other, in my early teens. I still miss them.
Thanks for this story.

[Jay]

Hi there! As I remember, Alfred has through the years added significant commentary to our lives about items that you would stray away from. I was on the receiving end more than once to "...Alfred says..." He also stayed with me when I was recovering from lung surgery and I was in need of some TLC that only Alfred and William could provide. I have been informed on many occasion that Alfred may outlive us all. Hope that your day after thanksgiving was better than the one that I had. We managed to give GM a $425 investment to have a defective window motor replaced.

Did you want to start a blog about whether or not the Government should bail out a set of corporations so we can repeat the process at a later time.

We had out first snow overnight and it was a dark and stormy night that would have been handled by a hug from Alfred. Have a good day, Love your big brother.

[jeanne]

Two things:
May Co. was indeed a great store. It was first bought out by Robinsons, becoming Robinsons-May, then was entirely engulfed by that ever-hungry bane of independent retail, Macy's (It also bought out that beloved mainstay of Washington state, the Bon Marche. Wankers!).

I still have Waggy, the little stuffed dog I got as a baby. He used to play Where, oh where has my little dog gone? Where, oh where can he beeeee? and wag his tail in time to the tune. Let's see - I barfed on his a couple of times, pulled off his eyes, and broke his tail so it didn't wag anymore. In a testament to 1950's manufacturing integrity, his little music box finally gave up the ghost only a few years ago. He has moved house with me six times and is probably my oldest possession. He's coming with me, wherever I go.