Prompt #17 - Toys

Prompt #17 - Toys

I am the first born, and the only girl, of three children born within four years. Although today I'm not a "fluffy" kind of person, not attached to "stuffies" as the kids today call their stuffed toys, as a girl I loved my panda and my dolls. My first doll, Betty Ann, had a pink dress with madras plaid trim at yoke and hem. Years later I realized that she was named after my mother's two sisters, and was a sign that I wished for sisters of my own which never happened. She met a sad end, a mysterious fractured skull which I always suspected that my brother knew something more about than I did.

The doll I remember most is Sally, my bride doll, who arrived from Santa one Christmas probably when I was about six. I probably named her Sally because that was the name of the baby sister in the Grade One readers from which I was just learning to read. Dick, Jane, Sally, Spot, and Puff. Back then, Bride with her white mary-janes, her white taffeta gown with net overskirt, her white net veil, stood for all brides, girls becoming young women becoming wives, making that transition from child to adult, from maiden to matron. Around that same time I had a chance to be a flower girl when my aunt Olive was the Bride so weddings were a big deal. A walking bride doll was one way society trained us female children to focus on our future as bride/wife/mother. I sort of grew out of that, accepting the revolution of the Sixties which implied freedom of choice and the expectation of independence and self-support promised by a career and a life outside a house which, through housework, we would still be expected to transform into a home.

Later, on that seminal trip to Ireland, I kept hearing the phrase "Bridget slept hear" and I did not know what or who they were talking about. My ears were piqued because Bridget was a nickname some friends gave me as a child, a shortened version of my surname. Bridget, the Irish hosts explained. Aka Bride. One of the three patron saints of Ireland. That was how I discovered my namesake, and that Bride was actually a goddess, one of the incarnations of the Celtic goddess of peace, patron of poets, smiths, cowgirls and cattle, with a cauldron of cream which never emptied. This meaning has remained closest to my heart. Goddesses represent the divine and the spark which resides within us all, which role models like Bridget keep alive for us everyday. So now, my dolls, my Bride doll, is recognized for what it is, an icon, and her resting place, for what it is, a shrine. Places where the divine lives and reminds us of our own divinity. I wrote a poem about this Bride, a poem which has been published in Canada, the United States, and Ireland.


I still have Sally, in the ancient family trunk which looks like a treasure chest. She is wrapped in silk, keeping the dismembered limbs together, awaiting the day when a doll hospital can reattach her arms and legs. I still have her white shoes, and also a pair of moccasins that fit her, and she still has the dress (minus the veil) although various kittens have not liked the net (at least that accounts for the shreds and tears in my mind.) She rests with three teddies, one in overalls made my an aunt, another a knitted bear with skirt made by my mother, and a calico bear I bought in Seattle when I first moved to the West Coast. They snuggle up with Brenda Jean, my last, a "teen" doll who arrived just before "Barbies" were invented. And a Quatchy, a Sasquatch "stuffie" from the Vancouver 2010 Olympics. Not that I'm a “stuffie” kind of person (did I say that already?) But there is always hope that some children may visit.

PS

I see I missed part of the prompt. Games. Our family were card players. 52 Pickup. Go Fish. Old Maid. Rummy. Crib. Crazy Eights. Canasta. 31. Bug Thy Neighbour. Hearts. 500. Euchre. And Poker and Bridge, which I have not permitted myself to learn because of the time involved. We also played board games like Steeplechase, Clue, and Monopoly which I hated then and which I still hate. I think it was the idea that in order to prosper you had to make someone else suffer. We also played Scrabble which I still play at least once a week, and constantly on my computer. We also played Crokinole which is a round board with a target design. By flicking your finger, you shoot wooden “rocks” like curling rocks or shuffleboard pucks at the opponent's or the opposing team's rocks and you try to finesse a “twenty,” which is sinking your rock in the centre hole on a deflection or directly, if there are no opposing rocks to get rid of. I have the old family crokinole board but it only comes into play if my brothers visit. I Googled this to check the spelling and to see whether the Canadian roots of the game are true. Wikipedia say yes, with a picture!