I cleaned my house today. By that, I mean that, along with the usual cleaning methods, I actually dusted my furniture as well. (I hate dusting.) I haven’t cleaned my cedar chest for months so I took everything off of it, including my little Uzbek chess set, and swiped all the dust off of the lid. Curiosity got the better of me and I opened up the chest because I couldn’t remember what all was in there. I don’t think I’ve opened it since I moved here in May.

All of my high school awards and medals were lying there, along with a quilt that Grandpa Miller made for me and some embroidery work that Grandma Hostetler had stitched. My Uzbek dresses were there and a little hand-painted tea set was packaged up in its box. The thing that stuck out to me the most though was what was lying right on top of all of that. It was my faded, torn, pink “blankie” that I drug with me everywhere I went when I was little. Anytime I saw my blankie or touched my blankie, my right thumb immediately went into my mouth. I slept with it. I wrapped my dolls in it. I wiped my snot and tears with it. I ate breakfast with it tucked into my chair. If Mom washed it, I stayed by the drier until it was back out again. I loved the warm feeling of it and the clean smell, but the hour of separation was intense. My blankie and I were inseparable. It was my sense of security. I felt safe when I had it with me. If my parents were gone, you better believe my sitter couldn’t take it away from me. To me, that huge, thin piece of fabric with the dotted lace edging was my safety and familiarity.

I pulled it out today and I couldn’t help but cry. I think I stopped depending on my blanket when I was about 6 years old. Yet, strangely, at the age of 21, that blanket brought back a load of emotions that I never knew existed. Who ever said that a 21 year old doesn’t need a blankie? What is a blankie, really, except a symbolization of security? I wished I could wrap myself up in it again and suck my thumb and see the world through the eye’s of my younger self. The world wasn’t so scary then. It wasn’t so hard. It wasn’t so full of decisions and schedules.

I rubbed the blanket against my cheek, swiping at my tears, then folded it back up very gently and laid it in the cedar chest. I sat down at the piano, pulled out a blank sheet of paper, and wrote. The chorus says this:
I was invisible. There was no danger in the world.
Nothing could stop me; I was a strong little girl.
I was a nurse. I was a baker, a princess, and a teacher.
Now look at me, I’m just a big girl who needs my blankie.