Beyond Babedom

We're (way) over 40. Deal with it.

Barbie Envy

When I was a kid, there was one thing I really, really wanted.

A Barbie doll.

Not the Miss Revlon my parents got me. Not some knock off. I wanted the real thing. Barbie, with her misshapen feet and enormous boobs. But I never, ever got one. [Stop while I wipe away a tear] My parents were so, so terrible to me which is why I grew up to be a terrible, terrible person.

Or not.

I thought they were mean. I thought we were poor. I thought my father was the biggest racist EVER. And I thought the only thing I wanted was to move away. So, here I am, more than 40 years after graduating college, living 2 miles from where I grew up. And so much wiser.

Because I now know my parents weren’t mean. They were just being parents with 6 kids. And while we didn’t have much, I realize now what poor really is and we were nowhere near that. And Dad being a racist? By today’s standards? Not even close. By the norms of the 1970s? Not even then. Yes, he was prejudiced and said some bigoted things. But he treated all our friends the same – black, white, Puerto Rican.

When friends needed a place to stay, they came to our house. When T.V. was living on the street, he moved in and became our third brother – the black one. What racist would allow that?

No; my parents were far from terrible. All it took was being around real racists and bigots and haters to figure that out.

 

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This entry was posted on Thursday, August 10th, 2017 at 6:16 PM and is filed under Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  1. Kathy Ybarrondo says:

    Only you could connect not having a Barbie to your dad possibly a being racist. Sounds kind of ridiculous.
    So did you ever get your Barbie?
    I wanted to BE Barbie as “that bitch had everything”.
    Think about it.
    xo

  2. Kathy Ybarrondo says:

    Hate my typos!
    What I meant was “only you could connect not having a Barbie to your dad possibly being a racist”.

  3. Delphine says:

    I remember being with your sister, your white brother and your black brother getting our picture taken in front of a welcome to Hazlet or you are entering Hazlet sign or something like that. Your black brother was wearing my girl coat. So funny

  4. David Alexander says:

    At least your feet aren’t misshapened!!

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