Remember Cabbage Patch kids? I think I was 8 or 9 when they really hit their heyday. I wanted one. Bad. It seemed like everyone had one. Even my friend Jeff Helmick who lived around the corner had a little boy Cabbage Patch with brown curly hair. My 4 cousins who lived in Roseburg all had one, even though some of them were much older than me. I remember my mom seeming a little confused about the whole thing. "But they're so ugly!" she would say. I finally did get one--much, much later, but for some reason when my mom took me to buy it I picked out a baby one that had no hair. I have no idea why, since their hair was quite possibly my favorite aspect of the Cabbage Patch dolls. My mom even asked if I was sure that was the one I wanted. I think it was the next day when the buyer's remorse really set in. Still, I had her and her name was Cordelia. Cordelia? Really?
Flash forward 15 years. It's 1998 and I'm shopping with my mom for Christmas and I see a 15 year anniversary edition of the original Cabbage Patch dolls. It was perfect, except it had yellow hair instead of brown. No matter--it still had the blue gingham dress, the white plastic shoes that never stayed on, the yarn hair curly on top with two straight pigtails, the classic Cabbage Patch smirk, plus the little envelope attached with the birth certificate. It was $40.00 and I bought it without a thought.
Flash forward again 10 years. It's 2008 and I'm sitting in Molly's room playing with her toys. She looks up in the closet and sees the box sitting on the top shelf.
"Doll?" she asks.
"Yes, that's a doll."
"Down?"
Hmmmm. I thought for a minute and figured now was as good a time as any. I have to be honest and say that I was kind of looking for an excuse to take it down, and once it was down Molly didn't have to work hard to convince me that the doll really needed to come out of the box. I opened the box, took off all the wires and string holding the doll in place, and there it was, in all its perfection. I brought it to my face and breathed in, and instantly I was back in Jeff Helmick's house holding his little brown haired boy Cabbage Patch. That smell! They all smell exactly the same, a mix of plastic and baby powder. I remember that feeling so distinctly of loving that smell and being so jealous that he had one and I didn't.
"Molly, doesn't it smell good?" I ask.
She humors me and tries to smell it. Then she plays with it for a minute or two before deciding to play with the empty box.
This experience means several things to me. First, the power of memory, especially the ones evoked by smells. How powerful they are and how quickly we can be transported back years to the exact moment and exact emotion. Second, the intensity of envy and how happy I am when I'm content to be where I am with what I have, instead of yearning for something else. And third, no matter how amazing or important or vital some item seems, no matter how much you think you have to have it, it only takes a two year old to let you know that, in actuality, it's really not that exciting and given the choice she'd rather have the box. And that maybe, just maybe, the wanting was based more on the fact that everyone else had one than on anything inherent in the doll itself.
3 comments:
I had lunch with Dean Helmick in December to talk about some legal work and he reported that all his kids are doing well and producing grand children. I cannot remember the details but generally everyone was doing well. The Helmicks live in Central Oregon between Sisters and Bend, and converting their home to an adult foster care home because they have all these bedrooms being wasted, and Dean cannot do any home building for the indefinite future because the market is really bad in central Oregon. Keep up writing your blog. I really enjoy your entries which are very well written.
Oh man! The smell! Ellie played with my Cabbage Patch Kids for a long time. We still pull them out now and then. A lot of their stitching is gone and the little formed fingers and toes are now on big nub. Good times!
I remember these dolls the same way. I also wanted 1 so bad. What was really amazing to me, is that these dolls were coveted by girls & boys alike. I am a boy, & I wanted 1. But I also never got 1. But 1 thing I did get an off shoot that also came with a birth certificate. I don't remember what the name of it was, but I loved it. Later, the doll I got was recalled due to some safety defect. I think it had something to do with the smell of the glue used to assemble the doll. I don't know. The fumes, maybe. We (my little sister got 1 too) never returned ours, & never got sick from them. But even ofter I got these, I still wanted the real Cabbage Patch Doll. But it was better then nothing.
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