How a hotel hero saved my family holiday

When my son lost his security blanket, disaster loomed. But I hadn’t counted on the superhuman efforts of our hosts

It doesn’t matter how or why, because I would never invade my children’s privacy like that, but a week ago a tiny piece of rag, full of holes and no longer blue, was left, let’s say by me (it wasn’t me), in a hotel. It used to be a blanket. It is still known to us domestically as Blanket. It smells of off milk in that way that everything too fragile to wash eventually does. It has been with us for nearly 13 years. Nobody knows for how much longer it will be needed, but please don’t triangulate this information to get any clues as to the age of the child who cares for it so deeply.

We were in Portugal, me and two children whose privacy I would never invade. We had arrived at our second destination, passed a delightful day and came to around bedtime, when one said: “Where’s Blanket?” I replied: “You tell me – it’s your blanket.” And the other one said: “I told you he didn’t check his room.” And the first took on an expression of blind panic that I recognised from the time I drove out of a motorway service station forgetting the dog.