Snowy and Alice are laid to rest. In the bin.

Sometime after we moved from our bungalow in the country to the lofty two-storey in Celbridge (with disappointing banisters) I was plagued with a Great Worry. Worries were not new to me - almost daily, something disturbing and grave was revealed to me about the world about me, and it was my lot to lie awake at night and fret about things like brainwashing, cancer, fire and germs (particularly the ones you got from eating things you found on the road, even though your mother warned you not to put them in your mouth). During one insomniac period, the fire fear in particular took up residence in my little-girl-mind, and I spent many a late night hour (often as late as 9 o'clock) perfecting elaborate plans that would enable me to escape crackling flaming monsters from my second floor bedroom window and land safely on the ground way, way below. These usually involved tying my bed sheets together in a secure but speedy fashion and abseiling down the cliff face of number 15 into the crocuses. A plan that saved me, but did nothing to allay the Great Worry - what would happen my toys?

Now, before I get dubbed a callous materialist, concerned only for a Sindy house or Scalextric while my family burnt to a crisp, let me make it clear: I had no intention of going looking for the Etch-a-Sketch as the flames engulfed me. But Snowy, Alice, Paddington and Pinky? They weren't just toys - they were family, for crying out loud. Besides, strictly speaking, both Snowy and Alice were pyjama cases. But I loved them dearly.

Alice had about twelve strands of wooly yellow hair that grew in a straight line from the top of her flat pink head. Fortunately, her pale colouring was nicely set off by her triangular-shaped, blue and white floral skirt (with a slit in the back where the pyjamas entered and exited) because it was stitched to the bottom of her neck. The entire ensemble was accessorised by two blue triangles, or shoes in the world of Alice and myself, stitched to the hem of her skirt. Truth is, she wasn't pretty in the conventional sense, but she had character and a certain innocent charm, and the guys were very fond of her. She was particularly close to Snowy, maybe because he was also a pyjama case, but with the head of a white furry dog and the added sophistication of a zip. Neither Alice nor Snowy were ever employed as such, however, and instead lived a life of relative leisure on my bed where they hung out with Paddington and the wise old elderly statesman teddy-bear, Pinky, who'd been knocking around since just two days after my birth.

Given that Alice had no legs to speak of, and Pinky was in a permanent sitting-down position, it wasn't clear how much help they'd actually be in the case of fire. I knew I was responsible for them, and I had to incorporate their salvation into my plan. So I resolved to chuck them all out the window first, and then descend on my bed-sheet rope to safety. So far so good. Until, greatly preoccupied, I hit a snag. Being a realistic child who had seen enough late-night films from behind the couch to know bad things can happen to good people, and are very much likely to happen to bad people, like those who try to push their (then bosom-less) little sister down the stairs, for example, I knew there was a chance that the flames would engulf me in my bed before I could scrabble to the window and chuck out Alice and the guys. Imagine the state THAT put me in. Hours, hours of fretting in my room with my trusting friends snuggled around me, oblivious.

I remember finally working it out. I got out of bed, and pattered into Ma and Da's room. I have no idea what time it was, but I'd imagine it was Very Late. But my task was urgent, so I shook Ma awake (I knew I was wasting my time with Da). As she opened a bleary eye, I explained the predicament. Quickly and with a precision born of urgency, I told her that what I needed her to do. Luckily, my mother was an accommodating woman, and I managed to elicit a promise from her that, in the event of her middle child being engulfed by flames in a fire, she herself would rescue Alice, Snowy, Paddington and Pinky and carry out the window-chucking plan as daughter number two was incinerated. I went back to bed and slept like a baby.

***********************************************

Time passed, and myself and Alice and the boys lost contact. Yesterday, I found them at the bottom of a very large box. Alice had holes in her head, where mustard stuffing was peeping out. And Snowy had lost his nose and much of his whiteness. Paddington was gone missing - he was always of a travelling bent. They were bundled in with all the other cuddly toys accumulated over the years, most of them intact and ready to be passed on to a children's charity. But Alice and Snowy were beyond even that. I had to say goodbye. It was a brief re-encounter that brought me right back to a moment of panic soothed in the wee hours of the morning when I passed the buck to my groggy mother, who probably doesn't even remember. Luckily, the fire never happened and she never had to step up to the mark. So Alice and Snowy survived to languish at the bottom of a box as their entirely responsible carer went vagabonding herself.

Yesterday, we - Alice, Snowy and I - said our farewells and I laid them to rest. In the bin. With First Love Susie, whose head had taken leave of her body. Pinky, now aged 33, came with me.