Barbie Dolls

When I was little, I used to be fascinated by the Barbie doll commercials that played on Cartoon Day, the day also known as Saturday.  I’m aging myself a little here, because as a nation we’ve become so indulgent that now there is never any day when there are not cartoons on the TV on some channel. Kids are no longer taught that they must wait patiently for six whole days until they see another cartoon.   But I digress. 

I was a boy.  Boys did not play with Barbie Dolls.  I had to ask my mom why they showed Barbie Doll commercials to little boys when we weren’t allowed to play with them, and my mom’s answer was that it was the same reason little girls were shown commercials for boys’ toys.  This was a non-answer, sure, but it quelled my line of questioning.  I was a boy, boys didn’t play with Barbie dolls, and that was that.  But why did I want to play with them so bad? 

Then one day when I was four or five, something amazing happened.  I was watching cartoons (which meant that this was a Saturday, because, as I’ve pointed out, that was the only day with cartoons on TV) and a new Barbie commercial came on.  This, my friends, was the best Barbie to ever be made, and the commercial made you KNOW it.  She was Peaches and Cream Barbie, and she wore a devastatingly beautiful gown with a sequins bodice and full, peach skirt.  She had a wrap of peach tulle which you could style in a myriad of ways to suit the occasion she was going to.  This, my friends, was the forbidden fruit in my own personal Garden of Eden: it was not an apple, it was a peach. 

My cousin Nita is six years older than I am, and her birthday was coming up.  This meant that she would have been turning ten or eleven years old.  My Gram decided she would take me shopping so that I could pick out a gift to give to Nita.  I was excited.  I knew we weren’t shopping for toys for me, but shopping for toys period was enough to get me going.  And this would be shopping for girl toys!  This was truly going to be a magical day!  And when we got to the toy aisle, there she was: Peaches and Cream Barbie in her shining cellophane packaging.  She looked into my eyes, and I looked into hers, and she winked at me, I swear it. 

“Gram,” I said, “this is what we HAVE to get for Nita.” 

Gram was not only down with my decision, she one-upped me.  She said we should get the doll and a package full of accessories to go with her!  It was almost too much.  I can still feel my heart swelling up in my throat when I remember driving back to Gram’s house to wrap our gifts up.  If it was possible, the real, live Peaches and Cream Barbie in my hands was even more beautiful than the model they used for the commercial.  She had a California tan, naturally wavy blonde hair, big blue eyes, and lips tinted peach.  The accessory pack included jewelry, a mink wrap, some brushes and hair clips, and a few more pairs of shoes.  This would be the greatest, most wonderful birthday gift anyone every received.  This was f***ing Peaches and Cream Barbie!

We went to the birthday party and Nita was playing with all her friends and I waited.  We had to all eat dinner, and I waited.  We had to sing happy birthday to Nita and she had to blow all the candles out, and I waited.  Finally it was time to open gifts.  Why couldn’t she open Peaches and Cream first?  Why did she have to wait?  Couldn’t she feel the energy radiating from the package I had helped Gram wrap with curly ribbon and a bow! 

Finally Nita opened the package. 

She looked at Peaches and Cream Barbie. 

She looked up at Gram, and she said thank you.

And then she dropped Peaches and Cream Barbie into a pile of  other presents and never looked at her again. 

I was a boy.  I wasn’t allowed to play with Barbie dolls, but I could barely eat my slice of birthday cake because of the lump in my throat.  I wanted so badly to see her again.  I needed to free her from her cellophane prison and hold her in my own hands.  Why didn’t Nita see that this Barbie wasn’t just any Barbie?  This was Peaches and Cream Barbie!  The Best Barbie!  She had her own commercial where she danced with Ken in the pale moonlight!

Gram came to my rescue. 

“Sister,” she said.  Gram always calls Nita Sister.  “I think Frankie might like you to open your doll so he can see her better.” 

Nita obliged.  I wasn’t allowed to play with her, boys can’t play with girl toys.  But for a few shining moments on my Aunt Sis’s couch, I sat silently and held Peaches and Cream Barbie in my own hands and stared into her deep, blue eyes.  There was love between us.  I knew it.  I could feel it.  Peaches and Cream Barbie and I were meant to be together.  But I was a boy and she was a girl toy, so I had to leave her behind and never see her again. 

Many years later, after relating this story to my friend, Judy, I received a nostalgic remake of Peaches and Cream Barbie for Christmas of 2010.  Thank you, Judy.  She is, to this day, one of my most prized possessions.  But it set me to thinking about girl toys and boy toys.  We know as children that they are separate.  If we are one gender we can never play with the toys of another gender.  But what if we divided up the toys based on skin color, or ethnicity, or religion?  What if I couldn’t play with Peaches and Cream Barbie because I didn’t have the right social status? 

Marriage, for me, is like a beautiful Barbie doll.  I can see it, I can want it, I can look deep into its eyes and know that I would love it dearly.  But because of my gender, and the gender of the one I love, I can never have it.  Marriage must be protected from boys and girls who play with the wrong toys by a shining cellophane package.  You would never think to deny me my marriage rights if I picked a spouse of another skin color, another ethnicity, another religion.  But because of the gender of the participants, we all look away when it is denied.  Why is it okay to deny a right in our society because of gender? 

I see so many marriages thrown into a pile of presents and never looked at twice by the people who are allowed to have them.  All I want to do is sit on my aunt’s couch and hold a marriage for a while.  I would love it.  I would treasure it.  I would make it my own.  But I can’t, because I’m a boy, and boys can’t have marriages to other boys.  Grooms are a girl’s  toy. 

Funky Tut

I was looking forward to this weekend so much.  First of all, I was going to the King Tut exhibit at the Pacific Science Center with Joseph and my friend Katie and Katie’s sister.  Katie and I are enthusiasts for all things Ancient Egyptian.  And my most favorite thing of all Ancient Egypt is the goddess Isis.  I love her!  Katie and I decided we were the new Priestesses of Isis, which mostly involved us bothering our super-Jesus loving coworker Taylor with pagan slogans we made up and using Isis-code-names for each other.  I was Frankertiti and Katie was Katiepatra.  We are pretty cool, I know.  Joseph was almost willing to be seen with us for this trip. And then I was going to go to the Zoo with one of my most favorite nuclear family units in the whole wide world on Sunday. 

So here are my complaints:

First of all, I’d like to apologize to the Pacific Science Center’s cash register cashiers.  I am so, so sorry I spent money that goes to pay your salary.  I could tell you hate customers, and I have to tell you that the feeling was mutual.  I am so sorry you had to help me.  I am also sorry that I found my way to the exhibit despite your directions mumbled at top speed.  (I’d like to seriously thank the HELPFUL PSC employee who directed us to the bathroom and the exhibit, you are amazing, I was totally lost! Don’t tell your jerk-face coworker.) 

Second of all, I can’t believe I didn’t pass out when, after waiting in line in the August sun I was herded into a small dark room with forty other people where the temperature was even hotter than out in the sun.  I am also at a loss as to why the little park ranger with the microphone felt the need to speak in a movie trailer voice. 

Third of all, I am an adult.  I can chew gum without getting it all over ancient statues.  Don’t police me, police the four year olds.  I can keep a stick of gum off offfffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff

Ghack!  I was holding my gum in my fingers to prove a point and kind of got it stuck on my F key!  I think it’s good now. Fff, yeah, pretty sure.  Sorry about that.

Fourth of all, I have never felt so underwhelmed with ancient statues.  I didn’t even have an overwhelming urge to touch one just to say I did it.  Everything was so overly lit and dimly encased in glass that I felt like I was in a boring jewelry store.  The black draperies were a little overkill; if they had gone with a turquoise or a powder blue I might be reporting a different impression right now.  And yes, King Tut’s statue was a little pudgy and black is slimming, but Tut has a reputation for opulence, and he could have used some Tiffany Blue, just saying. 

I will take a little time to report on my favorite piece.  It was a cat sarcophagus, literally a stone coffin built for a cat.  It was also Katie’s favorite, because she’s a lover of cats.  For me, though, it was the one place I found what I was looking for.  Joseph and I were admiring an Ancient Egyptian toilet seat (seriously) while I was telling some random guy that I’ve been trying to get my toilet seat in a museum for years, when I looked over at the Cat sarcophagus and saw a carving of a goddess with a certain house-basket hieroglyph on her head.  I knew from the Discovery channel that this was Nephthys, the sister-goddess of Isis, and that on ancient sarcophagi the sisters were depicted on opposite ends of each other.  I grabbed Joseph, pointed it out, and excitedly exclaimed, “If my calculations are correct, Isis is just on the other side!”

And she was.  Isis was hiding on a small cat sarcophagus waiting for me to find her.  I know King Tut’s father disbanded the worship of old gods in favor of a monotheism based on the Sun God.  One of Tut’s few accomplishments as a young Pharaoh was to turn the power back over to the priests and allow the traditional gods of Egypt like Isis to be worshipped again.  I didn’t expect to see much of Isis during such an exhibit focused on a time period trying to hush up old gods.  But I was sad I saw only one small depiction of my favorite Egyptian goddess, who stood facing a corner of the room like a punished toddler who tried to chew gum at a King Tut exhibit. 

And then I woke up on Sunday super excited for the zoo.  My GI tract was also excited, but not for the zoo.  So I had to miss it, and my favorite little nuclear family.  I’m super sad about it, but someday I’ll make it to the Point Defiance Zoo, which is in T-town, go Tacoma!  (Although, I kind of blame Tacoma City’s water for my GI problem.)