She stood stoically with her short, pudgy arms wrapped around the old worn out stuffed tiger, a present on her first birthday from her absent father. She left a trail of soft eider down feathers wherever she went, reminding me of Hansel and Gretel in the forest. I had repeatedly tried to coax Tigger from her arms for about a week. I wanted to mend him but she held him so tightly, even in her sleep, that I simply couldn’t pry him from her.
She always held him closely as we sat watching cartoons. I would sit cross-legged, Indian style, on the sofa and she would crawl up there and plop down in the middle of my skinny legs. As we watched the tube she would suck on her right thumb while digging in the hole in Tigger’s side with her left forefinger. I kept telling her that I would be very gentle, just as I am when she has a boo-boo, but she would have none of it. Short of ripping him from her arms and causing even more damage to her most precious possession I was out of ideas as to how to repair him.
All of a sudden I had an idea. I thought if I encouraged her to do the mending herself it might appeal to that independent streak she had inherited from me. I didn’t know how well a four-year-old little girl could wield a large needle and thread but we were going to find out.
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