Blankie anyone?

Image by MarkOMeara via Flickr

I went to my favorite American Heritage Dictionary today to check out the word blankie or blanky and there was no record of the word.  Thinking it impossible that no publication has picked up this common toddler term, I typed the word in at Wikipedia's Dictionary site and sure enough - here's their definition:
A blanket, especially a security blanket; often spelled blankie in this context.
 

Now, you may be wondering what the MindSieve is up to today with a discussion of blankie......well, as a matter of fact, last night as I was tucking that extra pillow firmly into its position next to my body curvature, I chuckled a bit and thought oh, isn't it funny that we adults presume that we gave up our blankies years ago?  Did we?

I had a young female sales executive who sent her husband home from the hospital delivery room to fetch her blankie - it was going to be a long labor and she needed it.  She had then, and may to this day, a scrap of her favorite baby blankie (blanket) that was always with her at night - at home or away.  I suspect her babies, now maybe teens, still have a remnant of their toddler years as well.  I know people who hold something in their hand all night, a handkerchief, a tissue, a grasp of a silky pillowcase.  Once on a NYC Midtown bus, I watched a young teen work and work and work what looked like a piece of yarn - over and through his fingers again and again - not frantically, but caressingly.  As we approached his stop, I observed him carefully rewind what looked like a piece of dirty yarn and place it deep in his jeans pocket.  I KNOW in my heart of hearts that that piece of yarn was what was left of his blankie.


I think many children attach themselves to a soft silky stuffed toy early in their lives.  My kids had blankies or substitute blankies - one of my daughters had a Raggedy Ann doll that I had to capture and wash in the washing machine occasionally - it was a stinky little thing but she loved it to pieces - literally to pieces!  I'm not sure when it made its last appearance.  I made the absolutely wretched mistake of throwing out one of my step-daughter's blankies in her early college years.  I had asked that her room be cleaned - she said that she had made a pile of keeps and a pile of throwaways.  In her absence, I mistakenly threw away the "keeps."  Oh my gosh, I'll never live that one down!......but the raggedy, green blanket was awful and I didn't know it was a treasure! 


So how about you?  Did your kids have blankies and did you?  Do you still have a blankie of some kind - something you never travel or sleep without.  An extra pillow is occasionally missing in a hotel room or a friend's guest room - I substitute a bath towel in my pillow's place if necessary.  It's not nearly as comforting or sleep-inducing as the real thing at home but I honestly can't see myself tucking my own feather pillow under my arm on every journey....well, maybe - there are certainly a lot of teens with pillows in their arms boarding flights these days.  Maybe not under my arm, but in the suitcase?
So tell me some blanie stories or disguise them as though they're someone else's blankie and not really your own.  Oh, come on, pleeeeaaassseee!:)