Playing with dolls was considered a sin for boys in the 1950s. Anyone caught playing with one was endangered of being labelled a queer and that accusation was impossible to erase from your peers’ permanent record.
All that changed when Mattel’s came out with Barbie 1964. The statuesque teen doll possessed Jayne Mansfield’s curves and a waspish waist unlike any women in you town South of the Neponset River.
My friends and I were on the cusp of pubescence and Barbie was our first girlfriend, although only when our sisters were not at home. They would not have liked what we did to their dolls; Barbie and Ken. The unspeakable was saved for Midge. We had no respect for her. At the end of my ‘play’ session I would redress the dolls and put them back where I found them with a warning to Barbie..
“Don’t say anything.”
Silence was always their answer and my sisters would ask the dolls, “Why aren’t you talking?”
They knew something was wrong and told my parents that someone in the family was abusing their dolls. I never admitted to the truth and Barbie kept her mouth shut even after I abandoned her for a Playboy featuring Dinah Willis as the centerfold. Barbie and I were done, but somewhere in my heart exists a atom of love for my first girlfriend.
Barbie had such tiny lips for a kiss.
Oh Barbie.
The first love is always the best.
