Beautiful (Mutilated) Barbie?

My sisters and I grew up with one major goal: get more Barbie dolls.

I treasured my Barbies, spending many hours doing all I could to provide for their comfort and happiness. I brushed their hair and made sure they were always fully dressed and properly accessorized with hats, gloves, belts, purses, and jewelry, right down to their tiny high heels. I even built my Barbie dolls a three-story condo from a cardboard box. I fashioned furniture and appliances from tissue boxes, and I made rugs for the floors and blankets, pillows, and bedspreads for the beds. I constructed a stairway (how else could they move between floors?), and I found pictures of handsome young men in magazines that I cut out, framed, and put on the walls and dressers. These were Barbie's "dates." I even arranged for flower delivery from Ken and her other boyfriends, and placed her lovely bouquets on tables and dresser tops.

When I was ten or so, I received a working toy sewing machine. My mother found several Barbie clothing patterns at a fabric store (do they still make these?), and I sewed an entire Barbie wardrobe from scraps of fabric I found around the house. We also had the Barbie Queen of the Prom Game wherein my sisters and I would discover who would get to date Ken and who would get stuck with the nerdy guy and who would have to stay home to wash her hair.

I bring all of this up because today in Yahoo In the News I found an article about the (still) best-selling Barbie doll and the "Voice of Reason." This rather confusing article discusses the ever-popular Barbie doll, how she continues to represent a distorted and unhealthy body image, and the surprising things little girls do to their Barbie dolls once they receive them. Is it possible that little girls do not idolize Barbie or desire to emulate her perfect body and "cool" lifestyle as we once did? When 100 young British girls were interviewed, it was discovered that many of them mutiliate their Barbies; that is, "Barbie torture (is considered) a legitimate play activity."

My sisters and I would never have dreamed of torturing our beloved Barbies. One reason may be the fact that I had no brothers. Boys are known for decapitating Barbie dolls and finding even more original forms of torture. (I know because my own daughter had to protect her Barbie dolls from her brothers, that is until she, being the oldest, roped them into playing nicely with her Barbies and her).

Also, back in the early sixties, Barbie was seen as a toy for older girls, so we didn't have Barbies until at least age eight. To us, Barbie time was serious playtime. We were mature enough to recognize the true value of the proper preparation of Barbie for a date with Ken, correct wardrobe management, careful accessory selection, and emulation through voice and thought projection and similar dramatic play-acting activities. Okay, we pretended a lot.

Besides, back then, little girls had baby dolls. Now, three-year-old girls have four or five Barbie dolls tossed across the bedroom floor. My theory is that present-day Barbie torture begins when a three-year-old can't dress or undress the doll (physically impossible at age three). The clothing becomes torn and eventually lost, the shoes get stuck in the heating vent. The hair starts to go reggae almost immediately, as the doll is dragged around naked by the feet. Eventually someone decides to add nipples and tatoos with a felt tip pen and the head pops off. And there you have it: girl-generated Barbie doll abuse.

I don't think it has anything to do with "Barbie-induced self-loathing" or any of the other social ills that have been blamed on her. In my case, had we mutilated even one Barbie, our parents would have been very unhappy and would not have replaced her. We weren't stupid.

Besides, when I was twelve, my father secured a job at Mattel toymakers. We now had access to all of the latest Barbies; a dream-come-true for girls of the sixties such as my sisters and me!

My new favorite Barbie had plastic hair in the shape of a bun. This was so each of her three wigs could easily fit onto her head. She could go youthful with a brunette flip style, or she could be a platinum blonde bubble-head or a flirty curly redhead!

Now what could be more fun than THAT?

I'm Dreaming of a - Wet Christmas?

If it ever looked like a white Christmas was immanent, this was the year for it!

And wa-la! It rained.

It was the craziest thing. Suddenly, you could walk outside in a t-shirt (well, compared to the sub-zero temps of most of this month and a good part of last). It was literally raining on the snow! After Dec. 21, the first official day of winter, I might add!

YUCK! What a mess! Slushy, muddy, puddles, and dirty, mushy "snow." But, at least by Christmas Day, the snow was all but gone, the grass was green (very well-watered at this point), and all the slippery ice had melted away.

The local children have all been grumbling about "no white Christmas, no sledding, no fun" etc. However, as I watched out my front window today I saw a group of children who had NOT given up. They obviously had recieved snow "vehicles" from Santa and were determined to use them. Their house located on the other side of the church parking lot that is across the street from us, an easy view from my living room window. What was left of the snow was piled at the end of the lot, just across from their house. They dragged a new sled, a snowboard, and a bright red saucer to the top of the mound and slid down, one by one. HMMPH. Very short ride. But fun!

They huddled and apparently made a plan. They went home and brought back two snow shovels. As one kid dragged pieces of the smaller snow mound to the larger one (to make it bigger, of course) another spread snow out from the bottom of the hill to make the ride longer. The third packed snow on top of the hill. Now, you must understand that this was very hard work. The snow is "old snow," crusty on the top from freezing, thawing, and refreezing. And being rained on and frozen again, it was more like, well, ice. But work hard they did, all in the name of FUN!

Finally, as I watched, the work was deemed complete. The children now, one at a time (there was only ROOM for one at a time) dragged their snow toys up the mound, which still didn't quite qualify as a "hill," and down they went, and it worked pretty well until they hit the hard asphalt at the end of the melting run. A very abrupt stop. But, with just a little imagination, they could have been the children in the picture above. Right?

By now, I went off to do something, probably the dishes. Two or three hours later I took my dog out for his walk (noticing that my face didn't hurt from the cold as it did the last few weeks) and as we walked around the block and passed the snow mounds, there was almost nothing left but slush. Across the street, the sled and the snowboard and the saucer were strewn across the lawn, but broken-in somewhat. Just as they should be on the day after Christmas.

It's a Cold One!

I don't know what it's like in your part of the world, but here in southeastern Idaho, it's COLD! This is only our second winter here, but apparently last winter was considered mild. My desk is situated in a corner of the living room where I can gaze out the window as I think and write. This is the scene that I am currently viewing; a winter wonderland! Of course, it helps to know I am inside looking out.

I really do love cold weather and snow. It's one of my favorite times of the year. But, my goodness! Last year it never dropped below 15 degrees or so (except one weekend it hit -0-). But this year we've had plenty of single digits, and the first week of December was minus 5 to minus 15 (that's BELOW zero!) every day!

Mind you, the first day of winter is not until December 21! That's not for three more days!

Now, when you have a house dog that be taken outside on a daily basis, you are forced to enter that beautiful winter wonderland and feel it. This means feeling not only the sharp frigid cold that forces you to cover every part of your body including your face. It also means feeling the sensation of trying to walk on a surface that provides no traction; so that in order to avoid slipping you must walk flat-footed like Frankenstein, often prefering to tramp through the snow than risk the slick sidewalk.

I'm proud to say I've only slipped twice on the ice, and once in a snow-covered parking lot. I survived without a bruise (snow is very soft) and no one saw me fall, as far as I could tell. I'm good!

Oh, another great thing is that the little dog that normally drags me around the neighborhood (short legs never walk, only run), now just slips and slides on the ice, putting me in charge! Those doggy legs look like blurry little cartoon legs, and yet he goes nowhere unless I choose to follow. Now he knows who's boss!

So, if you live in a no-snow zone, such as the central California coast where we're from, I hope I have given you just a taste of what you're missing. (You're either saying, "Gee, I sure wish I lived in such a lovely place!" or "You can have all that damn cold snow and ice!")

You can find another snowy winter image and some real Christmasy stuff too on my new blog, Link Letters. You're invited!

A Happy Accident

Did you ever take an accidental picture?

You know, you're trying to take a picture of something in particular and you know exactly what you want it to look like. Your subject is right there in front of you but illusive - you can't quite get it centered, and it keeps moving around. You turn the camera this way and that; and you move forward and then move backward. The wind is blowing and the light changes. You check the camera settings, then you try agin to focus on your subject. No, no, this isn't right! you think, and you briefly drop the camera to your side and oops! You accidently hit the shutter button.

Oh crap! A wasted picture!

Then, later, when you get your pictures back - hey! What's this? I don't remember taking this one... That's how this picture came about.

And I like it.

In spite of the fact that I took a photography class in high school, more photography courses in college, later a correspondence course, and later still, a refresher course at a local cummunity college, guess what? Accidents happen, and can bring surprising results.