TKOG Who goes public with her cuddle-buddy

Check out this week’s post at Life As A Human, in which I reenact a scene from When Harry Met Sally. No, not that scene.

NTKOG #173: The kind of discomfiting child-at-heart who indulges in public tête-à-têtes and tea parties with the stuffed set.

I am: usually in the process of trying (slash largely failing) to hide the most distressing of my eccentricities from human view.

I am not: ever going to be accused of excessive maturity. Just look at my bookshelves, in which new, un-dog-eared volumes of Sachar and Pinkwater mingle with Chekhov and Chabon.

The Scene: Amtrak, hurtling to New York. Started out all business: staked a window seat, plugged in my computer and cell charger, tucked my copy of Brideshead Revisited in the seatback in front of me. Then, to the intense discomfort of my seatmate, fished into my bag and pulled out a stuffed elephant, whose ears I kissed a few times before settling into a four-hour writing session.

This is Nichka. Despite the care-worn appearance, she’s only four years old. And if you have a problem with her, then I have a problem with you.

For context: Nich came into my life during the shitty summer I spent in Vermont (phtooey!) when I was 19. As a kid, I was generally pretty aloof with my stuffed animals – after brief stints of fascination, I’d inevitably abandon them belly-down in sandboxes. For whatever reason, though, Nich is real in a very veleveen rabbit way. Any time I know I’ll be spending the night elsewhere, she comes along in my purse; we often pass a pleasant half-hour chatting about world events, peanut farming, and reading aloud chapters of Wodehouse. Seems normal enough to me, but in our jaded modern world, the innocent love between a girl and her stuffed elephant is not to be.

By the time I’d written a paragraph on my computer, stuffed elephant nestled between ear and shoulder, my seatmate had pretty much gotten ceased the incredulous side glances. I was neither especially ostentatious nor reserved in my stuffed animal canoodling: the occasional stroke, a kiss here and there. No big deal.

However, when said seatmate exited in Providence, she wasn’t easy to replace. My train car was 85% full, and most of the free seats were rudely stuffed with bags and jackets. As new riders strolled the aisles, their eyes would lock hungrily on the empty seat next to me, then, once they took in my pachydermal lesion of etiquette, snapped up their heads and kept gazing into the distance. One gentleman got so far as stowing his luggage above my seat before he took a closer look at me, hoisted his bag back down, and moved on — eventually sitting beside a woman holding a tiny infant.

A bit over halfway through the train ride, I got a little peckish, so Nich and I worked our way up to the snack car. After some deliberation, chose a packet of peanuts, and cuddled Nichka while I ordered them.

The clerk gazed at me with genial embarrassment. “Are they for your little friend?”

“Uh, no, dude. They’re for me.”

The Verdict: I truly didn’t think this was that weird, but when the Amtrak snackette straight-out accuses you of being touched in the head, you’ve got to admit that you’ve been making some dang life choices and, uh, maybe not all for the best. Guess Nichka is doomed to spending daylight hours cooped up in my purse. Good thing she has the leftovers of that bag of peanuts to snack on while she’s in there.

Tagged as: actually she's three years ten and a half months (is best), amtrak, boston, new york city, nichka also hangs out with me during take-off and landing on airplanes. not that i'm scared of flying -- but she is., stuffed animals, the happy coincidence of doing a stuffed animal NTKOG while starting Brideshead totally amused me (Aloysius = total boyfriend), this is only second most embarrassing nichka story. first: when i got my wisdom teeth out and -- anesthesia kicking in -- asked the doc to put a surgical mask on her, traveling, velveteen rabbit, you're extremely damn cool if you actually get the aloysius reference by the way