I'm a Barbie Girl, In a Barbie World

When I think about being a kid, so many great things come to mind. Riding bikes, playing on Big Rock and in Pine Tree Fort. The castle on the hill beyond the road leading to our house. Ice skating and sleigh-riding. Our jungle gym. Playing house and school and office. All the fun things that we get to do when we are kids. And then I think of the moments of sexual awakening, which began, of course, while playing Barbies.

No joke, my Barbie was such a slut! She would wear these hoochie-mama outfits, always with stilettos, her perfect plastic boobs pushing the limits of the little plastic buttons that held her tight blouses together, barely. Ken was no slouch, either, his bulge making its presence known in his metrosexual style slacks. Barbie would go on a date with Ken, or sometimes GI Joe (he was more flexible and even had facial hair!) and once in a while Tonto, our Indian doll. Regardless of whom Barbie went out with, the date always ended with Barbie splayed on top of the boy doll, behind the town house or RV, while we made kissy sounds to accentuate the moment.

There was something satisfying in living out our young sexual fantasies in this way. Completely harmless and fun, being able to vicariously kiss boys and wear tight clothes in make-believe land, knowing that my mother would never allow me to actually do such things. I wonder whether boys had their own juvenile way of getting off. The boys in my neighborhood would want to play war, and capture the girls as their prisoner, the proximity of our wriggling bodies what I think they enjoyed. And we didn't mind so much either, allowing ourselves to become a prisoner of theirs for a few moments until they were called into dinner or had to rush off to defend their backyard from the other neighborhood kids in on the game. But nothing, not even the fleeting moment of having a boys arms around me, compared to Barbie time.

And now that I think about it, Barbie was single, ready to mingle, happy to have her multiple outfits and multiple boyfriends, never wishing to be married with children. She slept alone in her plastic bed (my Barbie would never bring a guy home... all of her liaisons happened outside of the home), but would be busy all day, cleaning her condo, riding her horse, making dinner, getting ready for her date. The worst part of her day was when she couldn't find one half of her pair of really hot heels (they were so tiny, it was impossible to keep track of them!) or got into a plastic-handed slapping match with her sister Barbie, who was stealing one of her many men. Slut, I tell ya, and a jealous one at that!

I Want Out

The weather has finally turned and it is beautiful outside. I love waking up to see the sun shining, feeling full of life, ready to start my day. Only to go into a dark cubicle surrounded by zero windows, imitation bright overhead and desk lights shining to simulate the sun that we will never get to see. And, on top of it, it is freezing in here. I come to work in a skirt and t-shirt and end up shivering throughout the day, trying to stay warm. My cute outfit is now overshadowed by the bulky sweatshirt that I have to wear to provide some warmth. I daydream of warm, cozy socks, hot chocolate, a fleece blanket.

My day starts with a bad case of spring fever and ends with a cold, runny nose. Perhaps a happy medium? Break down these cubes and let in some natural light. Let us see the blue sky that is rightfully ours for viewing. Get somebody to check out the heating/cooling system to see why my corner of the office is arctic, while other people are sweating at their desks. After so many cold days, with the threat of rain, throw us a bone. I know, I know. If my office was ideal, if I could indeed see the outdoors while working, would I be productive? I think so. But then again, I could just revert back to my schoolgirl ways and start staring out the window daydreaming about who knows what instead of focusing on the problem on the blackboard. It's days like this that make me think I'm not cut out for this office world. I should be working in Central Park, picking up sticks, driving a little cart around in my khakis. I love being outside. I just wish there were a way to bring a little of the outside in.

Nanie

This is a copied directly from something my grandmother wrote for me:

My mother died after child birth. I was 15 and Mina was 19. I had an older brother, Paul, a younger one, John, a younger sister, Maya and then the baby and, as you heard me say, her name is Bertha. My father never got married anymore and Mina was home (at the time of our Mother's death, Mina, I and brother Paul were working and lived where we were working)... coming back to where I said Mina was working, she came home and took care of the baby and family until baby Bertha was a year old and then she went back to the same place of employment and I came home until Berta was 3-years-old.
Then my sister Maya graduated from school and at 14-years-old, she, with our father's help, took over.

By that time John was working too (and I with the family he was working for) as a farmhand and later married the daughter of the farmer and had one baby but by that time the war broke out and he and Brother Paul are both MIA in Russia.

We had two aunts who worked as cooks here in the U.S. One was Emilia in Long Island and Tante Marie in Jersey. Mina worked at the time in the city of Kanstanz. You heard her talk about it many times but she wanted to earn more money in order to help our father more, so Tante Emilie arranged for her to come to the U.S. Mina was here about two years and I decided to come here too to get rich faster. At the time, I worked for a family in Zurich Switzerland and when I think back, had just as much in monthly wages (75 franks) as I had here. The only thing was a pair of shoes were a month's wages and the first pair I bought here (and they were nice ones) cost $5 and I made $45 a month.

In 1928 I came to the U.S. on the ocean liner Columbus and landed and was wondering what will be. It was at Ellis Island. A good thing the people I was working for knew some German as Mrs Simpson's mother was Swiss. Miss Tess, she was the daughter of the family Mina worked for, picked me up there and from the first day on I had a job working for Miss Tess's sister who was Mrs. Simpson and expecting her first baby. Mina and I were always domestics but at times worked in restaurants.

I didn't know your grandfather in Germany. I came from the state Wuttenberg and he was from the state Bavaria and the region he comes from is called the Rhine Pflaz and his father and two of his brother's plus grandpa worked in the coalmines in the Saar region. Grandpa's family were 5 boys and 3 girls and there is nobody left except nieces and nephews. When he came to the U.S. he intended to work in the mines in Pennsylvania but when he saw the conditions there he wanted no part of it so he took any job he could get. Got his driver's license and at one time worked as a lumberjack delivering coal and when the war started worked in a shipyard in Brooklyn until 1953 when he moved from Floral Park, Long Island to Monroe and here he worked for Lindross Associates. They made furniture for home and office until he had a heart attack at the age of 59 and died.

Grandpa and I met through Mina. She had knew him through some friends of hers where Uncle Julius lived... friend's who had what you called a boarding house and he and two other guys rented a room there.

---- And that's where it ends. I wish it didn't end. I could read her entire life story. For her story is my story.

You Smell Good

Can you remember all of the put-downs you've received in your lifetime? Those small sentiments, sometimes without offense meant but taken nonetheless, that stick with you, nagging, in the back of your mind? I surely can.

I recall vividly being told by a girl I barely knew in high school, while standing at the door, awaiting the bell to ring, that my lips were so "weird... Your top one is SOOO small, and the bottom one is SOOO big". My retaliation was "So?" I mean, what was I to say? And little did she know, that big lips would someday be a thing people coveted, going so far as to inject a foreign substance into them for the perfect plumpness.

Another such comment was made by my sister, back when we were little and trying to hone our singing and dancing skills. Ashley and Jessica we were not, but we liked to try and outdo each other with our stylings. I was dancing, thinking I really had something going and she dissed me, telling me that all I do is "shake my butt". We come from a family not known for their dance moves. Or rather known, but not in a good way. I thought I was breaking the mold. I didn't dance again after that for a long time. (That sentence makes me laugh. It reminds me of Footloose.... "until one day I had to cut loose, footloose...") And still, to this day, I will find myself in the middle of a dance, feeling self-conscious, knowing that my rhythm has gone astray and trying desperately to regroup.

Once, I was told I was ugly. It was during the summer, where we spent many weekends at the shore, on a campground. We were the regulars, along with a bunch of other people, so we were there every weekend, the young kids running around together. The excitement came when there were some people there just for the weekend, as long as they had kids our age. One such weekend, a bunch of guys arrived. They were there to drink and have a good time. They were not much older than us and they were good looking. I couldn't believe that the cutest of the bunch liked me and we ended up kissing. I wasn't the only one who had shared a kiss with one of those guys, but I was thrilled and I remember after that we would walk by their campsite often, hoping to hang out some more. Finally one of my male friends, who had spent time drinking with those guys, told me that the whole thing was a bet. They had a bet to see who could kiss the skinniest/fattest/prettiest/ugliest girl while there. According to them, I was the ugliest. I remember being devastated, but not even surprised. And then I was angry. I might have been unattractive on the outside, but their inner ugliness showed through and I knew that was worse. At that same camp, and old geezer who wore a yellow Speedo and would bend over showing the world, and us, young kids, what his mama gave him (he would also wear goggles while "doing laps" and miraculously would always be under water facing the diving board whenever one of us jumped in) one day called my sister "homely". We were young and she didn't know what it meant. She went home and asked my dad. Needless to say, my father had a little talking to to that old pervert and scared him enough to leave us alone after that. She still brings that up, that she was called homely, but that ugly man.

Yet, after all of this, I'm sure I have offended people directly myself through all the years of my life. I have to remember that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. You hurt somebody, it hurts them, and perhaps they go on to hurt someone else, to make themselves feel a little bit better. We have to try and do the same thing, but with compliments. Today, I was told that I smelled good but a guy in the office. I barely know him, and it made me feel happy. Pass it on.

Young Love

I was in a sorority in college. A no-name local sorority (perhaps three other chapters existed at other SUNY schools), that wasn't exactly filled with all the "popular", skinny, beautiful girls in expensive jeans. (I had thought popular ended in high school, but it sadly did not.) But we knew how to have fun. And we would rather hang out with the derelict fraternity down the block than the other ones anyway. With them, the feeling was mutual. We were a bunch of misfits, getting drunk, hooking up, having fun. From that imperfect union came a few marriages, a few babies and definitely more than a few one-night-stands. It was through that fraternity that I met my first real boyfriend.

I wasn't lucky in love in high school and that didn't change much in college. Except that during those four years of wildly finding myself, I found my first true love and we had 3 years together, which extended into life after college. I look back and wonder what happened to him, even though I know. But I wonder whether or not he remembers some of the things we did, whether he thinks ever about the good times or if the thought of me gives him a bad, acidic taste in his mouth. See, he broke up with me. I used to hate him for it, but now after so many years gone by, I don't.

I see people who look like him on the street, and wonder how we would react if we really did run into each other. It's not unreasonable to wonder; he doesn't live that far away and probably still works in the city, too. I think I would blush. I think he would avert his eyes and scurry away. I wonder why. He was an unemotional man/boy involved with an overly emotional woman/girl. He would often say "why can't you just be happy?" and I would think "how can you!?"

We drank too much together. When I drink too much, I cry. I cried too much for him. He was too constrained for me. But I loved him anyway. His stiffness and desire to be older than we were. To wear bow-ties and read Paul Bowles literary critiques while sipping some port and smoking a pipe. His first shitty apartment, the one in which he slept in the living room behind a Japanese screen. The walls of that apartment upon which had hoped to display artwork with little lights illuminating each piece, museum-style. I wanted to go to a Dead show. He wanted to go to the opera. We were mismatched, but yet, for a while, it worked. Until it didn't anymore and then it got bad. Really bad. For an emotional girl like me, mending from something like that takes time. It took me a lot of time. Not him. He moved on quickly and found somebody better suited to him, then.

The lesson I have learned is that sometimes things work out and sometimes they don't. And if they are working, don't question why. Don't read too much into your differences or why it shouldn't be. Instead, go with it. Love is not meant to be understood. You many not be able to just be happy, but you can just be in love.