Happiness is a Stuffed Animal

Wow. Talk about Great Gifts.
I've mentioned we have had two fires since my wife and I were married. The last one was by far the worst. We lost at least 90% of all our belongings. I'll write about it the closer we get to Christmas as for some reason it makes a nice holiday story.
Anyway after the fire one of the surprising things was most of our photo's survived. Some did not but most did.
Sadly I thought for the last two years that one photo in particular did not survive.
I wrote in my Oct 1st 2003 post that everytime Steve's girlfriend (and future wife) came over I would dress up nice in a suit jacket , hat and (clip on ) tie. One day Dad took my picture while I was dressed up waiting for Kathy . I'm holding my favorite stuffed animal Tony. Tony saw me though some of my saddest days while I was in the hospital after Steve shot me.
This picture was and always has been by far my favorite ever taken of me. I have an incredible sentimental attachment to it. After our second fire I thought it was lost.
But just a short while ago while looking for some more photo's to post I found it. A little worse for the wear but intact. Words can not describe how happy I am to see it. Losing it was on of the reasons I wanted to write stuff down for my kids. So that no more of their history would be lost.
Anyway here it is. To you it's just some photo of a kid looking like a dork. To me it's every happy memory of my childhood rolled into one. When one day comes and I edit this all together as a book for my kids this will be on the cover.