Old Things

Here I am!  I've been absent lately due to a host of little things ... you know how there are some days when you set out to do one thing and you never even get to that?  It's been like that around here.  One of my tasks has involved upgrading the operating system on my computer, which has meant a whole lot of little glitchy computer things ... but I think I'm back up and running now.

My mom and dad are in the process of moving out of the house they've lived in for 40 years, and so I've managed to bring home boxes of stuff from my life in that house.  My brain tells me to PURGE PURGE PURGE but there is the sentimentalist in me and, despite the fact that I've not even seen these boxes for 20 years (and I should just chuck them unopened), I can't resist opening the up to dig through some old memories.

So here's what I found this week.  Does anyone remember Marriott's Great America?  I worked at the Great America in Santa Clara, California (right across to the convention center where PIQF is, btw) for a summer and a spring break or two.  It was the perfect college-student job, with a whole lot of fun if you didn't mind the incessant noise and crazy people (we used to swear that they checked their brains at the entrance gate.)  Finding the park's event buttons which we were required to wear brought back a lot of memories.  I worked mostly on the park's flagship attraction, the double decker carousel right at the front of the park.  And yep, from time to time people got sick on that ride, even.

In the same box was my beloved Barbie, who is showing serious signs of aging.  Her mascara sure needs a touch-up, and she's got some serious neck issues.  Note the cracks   wrinkles in her neck.  She needs a good turtleneck ... or any clothes at all, really.  (They'll turn up in some other box, I'm sure.)  But the curl in her hair has held up for 40 years, which is something, and there's not a strand of gray.

And then there's the troll doll.

Strangely, I don't remember naming him... her... well, it.  And my sister and I played with them endlessly, in their shoe-box houses.  This little guy ... girl... thing seems to have aged better than Barbie, I'd say. 

I can't wait until my parents get into the storage area above their garage, where my Barbie dream house and my sister's Barbie's Dress Shop have been hiding all these years. We're already looking forward to a Barbie play day.