The Secret Society: Elspeth - The Secret Society

Here's the story of Elspeth, as best as I can 'splain it.

I have always kept a small mouse in the sun visor on the passenger side of my car. (When a passenger in my car lowered the visor, Mouse would drop down in their lap. It just happened that way.) Anyway, back when my lovely and amazing Moonbeam lived with me (my daughter) she would be the keeper of the mouse, and named her Broad. (After the street we were driving on when she decided to name her.)

On day,somebody in my car (who, by the way, I happened to be driving to the hospital in the midst of a suspected heart attack, but that's a different story.) freaked out bad when Broad dropped in her lap, and poor Broad ended up flying out the window.

Grief stricken, Moonbeam eventually replaced Broad with a plastic spider, who was named Elspeth. Elspeth lived in my car for some years. After Moonbeam moved away to college, we both missed each other. Painfully. Still do. Anyway, she would always look for Elspeth when she came to visit me. Elspeth was like an old comfort to both her and me. When I was missing my Moonbeam,I could always pull out Elspeth,see Moonbeams smile, and get a smile,myself.

So, I went to pick up Moonbeam for a visit awhile back. Aswe were driving, moonbeam pulled out Elspeth with glee, and happily carried her in her lap for the ride.

So, somewherealong the way, we stopped for gas,and got out of the car. It wasn't until over 100 miles later that (stopping to fix a flat tire) wenoticed that Elspeth was nowhere to be found. She had jumoped out of the carat the gas station.

Moonbeam was distraught. So was I . I tried the old "well,maybe some child will pick her up and love and cherish her" but Moonbeam came back with "No. She'll probably just be run over in the street." I knew she was right.We drove the rest of the way home in silence.

I couldn't ge tover seeing my kid be upset like that. Elspeth represented a bond between us, and I couldn't give up hope.

I had no idea where she was. I blew off a days work to track down what gas station we had stopped at. (Somewhere off a wrong turn I took somewhere along I-5.) ThenI tracked down the number. I called them, and pleaded for them to go look in the parking lot. I made them find out who was working that night, called him at home, and found out that he had, indeed, found her, and threw her in the trash. I made them go rummage through until they found her.

They were supercool about it, and didn't even ask for some time why I was so desperate to find a plastic spider.

So, I drove back down there. Took me over seven hours and arrived in the dead of the night. The people there said they had no idea what I was talking about, and that I'd have to call back next week.

Iwas a little bit upset.


I was pretty insistant. They found her. I got Elspeth back. I called Moonbeam with pride and toldher I had Elspeth and was on the way home with her. She had been run over, and ws a little worse for wear,but, hey. That sometimes happens when we go on an adventure.



It's been my number one goal in life to make sure tha tmy kids know that they are important enough to somebody that they would do anything for them. Including driving across two states to collect a fucking plastic spider.

It's also important tome to teach my kids no never give up hope. That if you really want something, do whatever you need to do to make it happen.