A post about a little pink pig

The pig game has been going on for about two months now. I don't really remember when it started, but somehow C.Z.'s tiny pink plastic pig that lives on my nightstand (who knows who long it's been there?) started having adventures. I'd find it balancing on the picture frame above my bed, poised by the light switch where I'd see it when I turned off the light, reading the title of my book through my reading glasses, observing the time on my clock, trying to climb up into my water glass, swathed in Kleenex (after it fell into the water glass) and doing various other things.

With time (and desperation, I suppose) the adventures grew more elaborate. One day I came in to find a Post-It Note on my night stand instructing the pig to climb to the top of my bed post and retrieve some basil. I looked up, and there was the pig, tied to a dental floss rope and taped securely to the side of the bed post, as though it were scaling a cliff. At the top was a film canister full of basil.

A few days later came the pig seamstress, complete with a dress pattern. That's when I started taking pictures:

And soon after that came a note instructing the pig to measure and cut five inches of dental floss. I still had no idea where the pig itself was, though, until I opened the drawer:

Last week when C.Z. and I got on the 1 train to go do our Jamaica Bay heron survey, she suddenly got the giggles and pointed over my shoulder. I turned around to see a pink pig, very similar to hers, in a NY Lottery Ad. "Oh, dear, it's following us!" I commented in mock alarm. We transferred to the A train. Another pink pig ad. But we didn't see a single pig ad on the way home. "I think the pig must have stayed behind in the North Muck," mused C.Z., referring to a mudflat we had explored on the East Pond.

I thought nothing of it until I sat down to read in bed that night. At some point I realized that the pink pig was missing, and a search of its usual haunts turned up nothing. "I told you I saw it in the North Muck," C.Z. replied. I went along with the joke, nodding, and said nothing more. But the pig didn't turn up the next night, or the next, until I eventually forgot to look for it.

Today we went back to the bay for our second September survey day, stopping off first at the East Pond. I sat down on a rock, pulled out my binoculars, scanned for herons and located two. I asked C.Z. to bring the clipboard and start timing, then I refocused on the first heron. Suddenly she exclaimed in a loud voice, "Look!" I turned around, expecting to see her pointing at some bird. But instead she was pointing at the ground beside me. And there in the mud, was...the pink pig, of course.