A frantic little voice yelling out in the middle of the night is always an exciting way to wake up.

It is an exciting way to wake up quickly.

“Where’s my teddy?!!! I can’t find my teddy!!  Where’s my teddy?!!”

My wife got up and I could hear her talking to him…getting our youngest son calmed down.  She started laughing softly and told him, “it’s OK….he’s right here.”  Teddy was found…and with a kiss, our son went back to sleep.

I asked her where Teddy had been when she got back to bed…”Right by his arm…about 2 inches away.”

I think that things like that are funnier to me when I’m not the one getting out of bed.

There isn’t anyone left to find my “teddy”.

Losing a parent is a sad part of the process…but it’s the way things work.  Both of my parents are gone now…no one left to find my “teddy” even if I was so panicked that I needed them to do it. I think it probably is a parent’s job, anyway….I wouldn’t  shouldn’t ask my wife to get up and go looking for him if it was me doing the losing. That’s part of the process, too, I guess…outgrowing the need to have someone else fix my problems. I’m still working at figuring out how to do that part of growing up.

Maybe the secret to really appearing to be an adult is never mentioning when you think you’ve lost your “teddy”.  It has to be better to just lay there, wide eyed and frantic…afraid to reach out those last two inches because he just might not be there….or, maybe even scarier than realizing that the solution to the problem was never there when you looked for it…to realize that the solution to the problem was right next to you the whole time.

Most of us can wax poetic over solutions to someone else’s problems.  It’s easier to laugh when it’s someone else getting out of bed.  I know that most of the time, when I’ve been able to finally calm down and someone can point out, “It’s OK…it’s right here” things tend to get fixed quickly.

I don’t have a stuffed bear.  My “teddy” has been replaced with a pantheon of adult concerns…like expensive watches, Italian shoes, and full length fur duster coats.  Just kidding about what I consider adult concerns…the truth is much more down to earth and realistic. No matter how practical and common the needs are, though….I still wake up some nights wondering, “where’s my teddy?”