37/365: Linda

Linda had run the preschool next door since the beginning of time and was kind of like a neighbour to us. Sometimes dad would stop and talk to her and anyone else in the neighbourhood while he was supposed to be taking me to school and then I'd be late and then I'd have to ask the receptionist to make up an excuse for me because "my dad's chatty" is the most pathetic excuse ever.

But Linda had a deep dark secret. She was afraid of animals in all their cute, fuzzy, loveable incarnations. One day we got a phone call with instructions that we were to come running with a box. Mom took a laundry basket over.

It was almost two months to the day past Easter, and someone had abandoned an unwanted bunny to starve to death in the park. A kind soul caught it and brought it to the preschool, which had poor Linda in a panic. She was quite hysterical, apparently.

Mom arrived back with the most pathetic, emaciated bunny I've ever seen, and that's how I got Mr. Bumpy. Within a month he was housetrained, a neighbourhood celebrity and he had almost doubled in size. We're big suckers when it comes to animals.