Object-ives #3: Why I Chat Regularly to a Toy Turtle

How a gift from my dead friend ended up helping me

Lucy Felthouse talks to her ever-present toy turtle

I can’t remember exactly how V and I first met, only that it was online at least 15 years ago and through our mutual erotica writing activities. When we finally met in person, it was clear we had that (platonic) “spark,” and our connection quickly expanded and grew. We morphed from colleagues to friends, exchanging birthday and Christmas cards and gifts. We’d see each other maybe two or three times a year at writing-related or adjacent events, and also meet up occasionally “just because.” Meetups involving V were always fun. Always. She didn’t just bring the party, she was the party.

One day, when we were together in person—I forget why or where—we ended up reminiscing about our early school days and discovering we’d both had at our respective schools a robot shaped like a turtle, which would be connected to and controlled by a computer. It was completely random, and utterly silly, but it amused and bonded us and became a daft in joke. From then on, gifts we exchanged would often feature turtles. I would always be on the lookout for cute turtle-related items that could easily be popped in the post to her. We both ended up with quite the collection.

Fast forward to 2023, and V was having health struggles. She was suffering with severe headaches, more like migraines. At first, it was hoped some glasses would help, but sadly it wasn’t to be. What followed was a series of strokes, a few visits to hospital—some planned, some not—and an eventual diagnosis of vasculitis. In typical V fashion, she bore it all with wit, humour, kindness, and strength, posting regularly online to keep people up to date with what was happening. Her final post on Facebook praised the beleaguered NHS for everything they were doing for her. That was her all over—seeing the good in others and finding positives, even when she was being put through the metaphorical wringer.

She was a force—for good, for kindness, with such a zest for life it never even occurred to me in the beginning that the disease might take her. Unfortunately, it did. After several months of fighting, and a few weeks of rapid decline, V sadly left us—her husband, her child, her family, and an insanely large number of friends. All shocked, devastated, and, certainly in my case and I suspect many others, feeling an enormous sense of injustice that such a wonderful person had been taken so early. Someone who only ever helped people, spread love and joy, and never harmed anyone. The world was, and still is, a much poorer place without her in it.

The weeks and months that followed were difficult for reasons both related and unrelated to V’s death. My mental health wasn’t the best and, in looking for ways to cope, I stumbled across a really unusual tactic. One day I found myself sighing and glancing around my little home office. My gaze landed on my collection of turtles. Naturally I thought of V, and I couldn’t help smiling. That was the effect she had on people. I picked one up—the first one she gave me, which makes it special—and studied it, turning it this way and that in my hand, enjoying the cute look of it, and the tactile sensation of it in my fingers.

The next thing I knew, I was talking to it. As though it was her, or some sort of spiritual embodiment of her, perhaps? Either way, I ended up spilling the beans of what was bothering me to my tiny turtle, like it was a therapist or something. Unsurprisingly, I felt better afterward. So I did it again. The next time, I ended up imagining what she might say in response to me, had I actually been talking to her. Imagined the advice, the encouragement she might give. And I took strength from it. It made me braver, take more chances, step outside my comfort zone. Made me stop worrying so much about what other people thought. Encouraged me to be kinder, more understanding, more empathetic toward others. All of these things in an effort to “Be More V,” which was a slogan another of her friends came up with in the aftermath of her passing.

Even as I write this piece, my little mate (V and I always called each other “mate”—it’s a British thing) is sitting beside my laptop, and I’m drawing strength from its presence. Even looking to it for inspiration. It’s brought me so much comfort over the last eighteen months—even coming on multiple outings with me to teach writing classes and give talks, where I’d hold it in my hand or have it close, giving me the courage to carry on when fear threatened to strike at the sight of a room full of people there to hear me speak. Pushing me on to do what I went there to do, and to the best of my ability.

Maybe others will think it’s crazy, or weird. Honestly, I don’t care (oh, there I go, “Being More V,” not caring what others think). Surely it’s only the equivalent of going to the site of someone’s grave, or where their ashes are scattered, maybe even talking to a photograph of a loved one?

Crazy, weird, or perfectly normal, it doesn’t matter. It works for me. I may not have actual V in my life anymore, but this quirky, spiritual version of her lives on, enriching me and my life in so many ways. And I honestly think she would love that. A wonderful spirit such as hers will always live on in others, in the lives she touched. If, for me, that mostly involves chatting to a tiny plastic turtle, then so be it.

Lucy Felthouse is the award-winning author of erotic romance novels Stately Pleasures (named in the top 5 of Cliterati.co.uk’s 100 Modern Erotic Classics That You’ve Never Heard Of), Eyes Wide Open (winner of the Love Romances Café’s Best Ménage Book 2015 award), The Persecution of the Wolves, Hiding in Plain Sight, Curve Appeal, Not That Kind of Witch, When Christmas is Cancelled and The Heiress’s Harem and The Dreadnoughts series. Including novels, short stories and novellas, she has over 175 publications to her name. Find out more about her and her writing at http://lucyfelthouse.co.uk/linktree

Object-ives features flash nonfiction essays of 500-999 words on the possessions we can’t stop thinking about.

Recommended reading and viewing on possessions:

“My Year of Decluttering—Purging 365 Things in 365 Days” by Open Secrets Editor-in-Chief Rachel Kramer Bussel

“‘It’s like Instagram in real life’; The rise of junk journaling in L.A.” by Malia Mendez, Los Angeles Times

“What I Wanted, What I Got” by Rachel Kushner, The New Yorker

“10 Tiny Homes” by Julie Lasky and Tim McKeogh, The New York Times

“Sports collector helps N.J. man sell baseball card collection worth millions,” NBC News

“Millennials Set to Inherit Boomer Junk” by Soo Kim, Newsweek

Substack Note by

Kristi Koeter

about throwing away clothes