I remember, I was young. She said,

Toys don't last forever.

And I suppose that's true. As a I grew I moved on, didn't care for some toys as much as others, lost some to yardsales or excursions.

Toys don't last forever.

But Woody was always supposed to.

And I guess he did.

In a way.

Somewhere he's still out there lasting forever, with a little girl who will love him and play with him. With him and Buzz and Jessie and Slinky... Man I miss them. Man.

And he'll always live on in my memories and mom's nostalgic home videos.

But what's going to last longer, longer than the toy itself, longer perhaps then the earth itself (one day we are all totally going to live in space), is what Woody meant to me. He wasn't a collectors item or a mindless doll.

For a very long time he was my best friend.

Perhaps my only friend. But more than that, also... The man in my life. A substitute dad.

The hero in my life.

Toys don't last forever.

Neither do parents.

Dads who are supposed to be there forever. What had happened to that?!

My toys had lasted much longer than my father's love for me or Molly had.

Molly never even knew him.

My mom never told me,

Dads don't last forever. But I guess in telling me that even Woody might break she told me that dad could too. Trying to explain why his dad had left and wasn't coming back.

Because something inside the man was broken.

It wasn't as easily fixed as a ripped cloth limb. Or as easily discovered.

When Woody broke I was heart broken.

When dad left...

Some things are too hard.

I'd been the one to break Woody.

So of course... I had to have been the one to break dad.

I shuffled papers on my desk to disguise the sounds of tears falling. My roommate might be awake and he wouldn't understand crying at 6 AM. I"m supposed to be writing a paper on my family history.

I'm majoring in psycology, particularly in the psychology of children. How their minds work, how different things affect them.

Like family.

And favorite toys.

And loss.

So now I have to learn about my family. Molly's easy enough, she's a little shallow but never ill-meaning. I write a paragraph about her and a paragraph about my mom and her extended family, even though I barely know them.

It's painful when I get to dad though.

Sickening.

Just a reminder that everything breaks. And nothing lasts forever.

The one thing I know for certain is that you're not supposed to blame yourself and that children always do. Every divorce, every mom or dad leaving, every death. The kid usually blames themselves.

And I didn't need to major in Psychology to do it.

Mom was always telling me, back when I used to ask, your father leaving isn't your fault.

She also told me, toys don't last forever.

Dad was no toy, but he was hardly a man.

And to him, we were the toys. Easily discarded.

Forgotten.

How can a thing like that be easy?

I outgrew my toys but I never fogot them. Everything they meant to me is still a part of me.

Of course, there were toys that didn't mean anything to me. Like Molly's Barbie doll.

I guess that's how he saw us. Someone else's responsibility.

Meaning next to nothing to him. So he discarded us and moved on.

It's unfair.

That he decided we mean nothing to him, that we aren't a part of him, and yet on foggy morning's like this one he's so much a part of me.

No, that's not quite right.

He's a part that's lacking in me.

Like a ripped off cloth arm.

And there's nothing I can do to fix that.

Here's the first in my Toy story anthology, with two chapters to follow! I think you'll find the next ones interesting, but I hope you liked this one too, because I've been watching the trilogy (I'm on the third) and have been having lots of serious thoughts about the characters, particularly Andy and Sid.