When I was about five, all my friends and I started watching Ghibli movies at home. The first one everybody watched was “My Neighbor Totoro,” and one of my best friends’ little sister got plush dolls of all three Totoros that appeared in the story: a small one, a bigger one, and a huge one.
Her favourite was a bigger Totoro. Whenever I visited her house, the blue Totoro with a sack on his shoulder accompanied her. On the other hand, the small one and the huge one were almost always left alone.
One day, I picked up the huge Totoro and tried cuddling it. It was the largest plush doll I’d ever seen, and I liked the way my arms had to stretch to hold it against my body. When I held the Totoro to my chest, it was so comforting that I didn’t want to let it go.
From that day on, the huge Totoro became my favourite. Whenever I visited my friend’s house, I’d look for the large black Totoro and carried it along with me.