Toys R (not always) Us
Two of the super cute & put-together Shaddock cousins on the right. Me, looking like a dirty & blurry ragamuffin as usual, on the left.
Angela and I have been trying to get the Holiday Pasticcio "put to bed". But no, don't get excited yet, we aren't that close...
One of the upcoming Pasticcio "articles" called for snapshots of us with our moms - in mine, at the tender age of three, I'm already scooching as far away from her as I can on the davenport (now, in my sophistication, I call it a "couch" but back then it was definitely a davenport) to schmooze with her girlfriend. That snapshot was rather miserably faded, as many from the era are now. And I feel sad that I wasn't sitting right next to my own mother.
For the letters to the editor page, Angela has a fabulous promo photo of herself holding an Angela doll - she looks just darling, so does the doll. The analogous photo I found, after much searching? Well, in it I AM totally clutching a dollie, but when I think back, I'm pretty sure that doll wasn't actually mine - it was a doll I was allowed to play with when I visited my Grandad and Magy (maternal grandmother). I loved it, but only every few months. As for the image of me? I look like nothing more than a messy little 1950's street urchin, precursor to the adult ragamuffin I remain. I have never been able to achieve a polished, put-together look, even when I thought I wanted to. So much for dreams of being Julie Christie...
Earlier today I was thinking about a little felt mitten bookmark one of my grandmothers made for me way back in the 1960's, with a spring mechanism hair clip. It was white, and she stitched a little lace cuff onto it, and embroidered pink flowers with french knots. I looked online and found some current patterns but they are so FAT! She must have drawn the design herself as it was such a beautiful, delicate little mitten shape...
Why don't I have ANYthing left from my childhood except for a half dozen books? Hardly any photos even. The thing is, we were so poor and moved so often when I was younger that when I left my parents house at 17 for good and all, there wasn't that much I ever actually had, and what I did have, I know I callously said, "Oh, that's just material stuff...I don't care about any of it..." and it WAS just material stuff...and yet. I wish I had a little bit of it still - that little felt bookmark, my ice skater Betsy McCall doll, the kinda weird yet cool pose dolls my mother occasionally got for me ---
Confidential to September - those paragraph breaks are for YOU!
One of the upcoming Pasticcio "articles" called for snapshots of us with our moms - in mine, at the tender age of three, I'm already scooching as far away from her as I can on the davenport (now, in my sophistication, I call it a "couch" but back then it was definitely a davenport) to schmooze with her girlfriend. That snapshot was rather miserably faded, as many from the era are now. And I feel sad that I wasn't sitting right next to my own mother.
For the letters to the editor page, Angela has a fabulous promo photo of herself holding an Angela doll - she looks just darling, so does the doll. The analogous photo I found, after much searching? Well, in it I AM totally clutching a dollie, but when I think back, I'm pretty sure that doll wasn't actually mine - it was a doll I was allowed to play with when I visited my Grandad and Magy (maternal grandmother). I loved it, but only every few months. As for the image of me? I look like nothing more than a messy little 1950's street urchin, precursor to the adult ragamuffin I remain. I have never been able to achieve a polished, put-together look, even when I thought I wanted to. So much for dreams of being Julie Christie...
Earlier today I was thinking about a little felt mitten bookmark one of my grandmothers made for me way back in the 1960's, with a spring mechanism hair clip. It was white, and she stitched a little lace cuff onto it, and embroidered pink flowers with french knots. I looked online and found some current patterns but they are so FAT! She must have drawn the design herself as it was such a beautiful, delicate little mitten shape...
Why don't I have ANYthing left from my childhood except for a half dozen books? Hardly any photos even. The thing is, we were so poor and moved so often when I was younger that when I left my parents house at 17 for good and all, there wasn't that much I ever actually had, and what I did have, I know I callously said, "Oh, that's just material stuff...I don't care about any of it..." and it WAS just material stuff...and yet. I wish I had a little bit of it still - that little felt bookmark, my ice skater Betsy McCall doll, the kinda weird yet cool pose dolls my mother occasionally got for me ---
Confidential to September - those paragraph breaks are for YOU!
Labels: an examined messy life, childhood, dolls, felt mitten bookmark, memoir, pasticcio, toys
posted by sf @ 1:19 PM
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