This week in the Book of You, Written by Me series, we are asked to write about the first toy that we can remember. For me it was a doll named Mary. I don’t remember who gave me the doll. Maybe I got her for Christmas. I was about 3 years old at the time.
Mary was the first doll (and first toy) I really remember owning that was all mine–not something handed down or shared with my four siblings. I can’t remember where I got her or who gave her to me. What I can remember is I took that doll everywhere. She slept with me. She took baths with me. We went to the store together, too.
Poor Mary. She was the most loved and probably the most abused doll ever (Yes, you can love something too much!). I don’t have any pictures of her. But, I remember that she looked pretty pathetic after awhile. Her hair was short to begin with, but it had gotten clumpy and there were some bald spots. She had a leg that was loose and kept falling off. One eye was constantly closing, too. My poor one eyed, legless Mary. LOL I didn’t care what she looked like. She was mine.
It speaks volumes about how much I played with that doll in that I can still remember her over 45 years later. After Mary, I got a doll each year for Christmas. Tippy Tumbles, Blythe, and a whole host of other dolls that did stuff like mix pudding and flip somersaults. But, I think I will always remember Mary the most. She was the first, after all.
This is me, Christmas 1967 with the new Tippy Toes doll that Santa left for me under the tree. Though she wasn’t the Mary doll, she was still pretty neat. I loved dolls that did something.
