I have to share something that I just found. It's an interview of Sesame Street's Cookie Monster that was done on NPR. You can find it at

http://www.npr.org/blogs/incharacter/2008/02/cookie_monster_comes_to_npr.html

I'm not even kidding when I tell you that this almost made me cry. (PS - I don't cry. Seriously.) The second I heard Cookie Monster speak, I was four years old. I was in front of the brown box TV back at 2155 Monaco, the setting of all of my earliest memories that remain. I don't know where Mom was, and Chad was probably asleep on the couch, propped up by a pillow so he wouldn't roll onto the floor. But I was there, watching cookie monster introduce the letter C--the letter that started my name, his name, and our mutually preferred dessert. It was almost like having an out of body experience.

I can't really explain the feeling. I had no idea that there was a space inside of me that there was a cookie-monster shaped hole inside of me. I honestly can't comprehend what went through my mind right now, whether it's a longing to go back to the past or a firing of a nerve in my mind that brings back a happy memory I had no idea was there. I wish I knew more about psychology so I could delve into my own inability to explain myself.

I'm grabbing for a point that I don't think I'll get to. I love cookie monster. And it's a love that truly is perfect in its own sense, because it is the love of a child. I can't think of anything in my life, outside of my family, that I have the same kind of love for. Whether there's a real-life connection here or not, it's real to me.

Like I said, I don't know where I'm going with this. Maybe this happened so I'll give my kids these kinds of memories. Maybe it happened so that you'll be reminded of someone or something that you love without precedent. Whatever my reason for writing this, Cookie Monster made a difference in my life. As stupid as that sounds to you, I love it.

I gotta go find a cookie.