When My Mother Gave Away My Barbie Dolls

She didn’t know she took away my muses

I was twelve years old and nearing the end of sixth grade when I walked home from school, up the stairs, into my bedroom, and opened my closet door to a puzzling sight. All my Barbie dolls, their wardrobe cases, their home, car, swimming pool, camper, and airplane were GONE!

I remembered we were moving to another town in about a month, so I guessed my mother had begun packing my stuff already. I went back downstairs to ask her, “Hey, where are all my Barbies and Barbie stuff?”

Her face said, “Just listen and shut up about it.”

Her mouth said, “OK, I’ve decided you are too old for all that stuff now. You hardly ever play with it anymore, right? I’m not moving all that stuff to another house. I gave it all away to Goodwill.”

I don’t remember how long my stunned silence lasted.

She had never told me of this plan. She never asked me if it was alright with me if she gave my dolls and doll accessories away.

In the past, she had occasionally asked me and my younger sister to gather our old toys to give away, which we didn’t mind because we got to choose what to part with. We felt good about making some needy children happy.

But this was so unexpected, abrupt, and cruel, even for my mother who liked to say she was “no Carol Brady.”

My mother had been closer to my sister than to me for as long as I could remember, probably because of their shared love of horses and ballet.

My sister would sometimes “play Barbies” with me during our childhoods, as we were only seventeen months apart in age, but she was never passionate about it.

She had to be extremely bored to play Barbies, so all of them, even the ones she got for Christmas and birthdays, ended up in my bedroom closet. Her room was filled with plastic horses and horse books.

But I played Barbies like no one else I knew.

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