Doll

I never understood little girls' (or boys, for that matter) quasi-fetish for dolls. Dolls always creep me out. When I walked on the alley of Toys R Us I always felt the stare coming from thousands of blue painted eyes of Barbie Dolls. They tend to be blond, wavy hair, with disproportionate big breasts and freakishly long legs. They stood so silently in the narrow plastic box with their plastic accessories. Smiling radiantly, as if to flaunt their artificial beauty, non-existent wealth, or arguable youth. They do not age, granted, but the eternal youth most certainly is not derived from the fountain of youth. They are beautiful corpses at most, each after each, confined in a transparent coffin. Upon this thought I always shuddered. In my slightly peculiar nine-year-old mind Toys R Us was not the wonderland for kids, but some revery for the necrophile. And I never wanted to imagine how the stacks of Barbie Doll boxes would look like at midnight, during the wee hours when the dark, the dead, or the undead supposedly  wake up and party.

As much as I do not fancy Barbie Dolls, born as a girl, I still received many. Unlike my very gender normal peers who collected pink and puffy Barbie dresses my dolls were either stripped or decapitated. Why I even did that I do not remember. But adults were visiting and saw what became of their gifts they did stop giving me Barbie Doll as presents at some point. My parents scolded me for not taking good care of my toys. "Look at your sister. She even made a closet for her Barbie dresses." But the thing is I did not want them in the first place. Despite my lack of care for Barbie Dolls, my mother would bring me to Toys R Us every time I achieved a tiny accomplishment: scoring top in school or win another writing contest. Little did she know, those visits to Toys R Us seemed to me more like (if I shall phrase it positively) a thrilling adventure to a haunted house than a fulfilling treasure hunt. Just think of the smell of sheer plastic, the cold, lifeless stares from the equally lifeless rubber beauty trapped in glass coffins. No it wasn't a treat. It wasn't a treat at all.

Sponge

Does it ever occur to you that a dry sponge looks a bit like cheese? Holely. Yellow. Dry. No you surely don’t like dry cheese. French cheese is the best. The more they stink the more you drool over them. You always say does Gouda even count as cheese? Uncreative color and uncreative texture. No you don’t like Gouda. The only non-French cheese you can put up with is feta and cheddar. You can munch on them like a mouse. You remember when you were in France there was always this fancy cheese plate between the main courses and the dessert. Unlike most of your poor lactose-intolerant friends you had no problems at all. You didn’t even need baguette or red wine to go with the cheese plate. Roquefort and camembert were a must, if it was a special occasion you got Mont d’Or, or even Maroilles when you were traveling in the North.

Outside France you were still choosey in terms of cheese. You went to the supermarket hunting for good cheese but they seemed boring. The Allgäu disappointed you and you forgot it in the corner of your fridge. When you finally thought of it and fished it out from the fridge it was already old and dry. You took a bite and frowned: this not only looks like sponge, it actually tastes like sponge! You got rid of the old cheese and started doing the dishes. The sponge was dry. It looked kind of like an old flat piece of cheese. You rinsed the sponge and started scrubbing the plates. Bubbles popped out with detergent. You were washing with bare hands and the cold water and bubbles pierced your already rough hands. The rinsed sponge turned soft, and your hands had an even  rougher texture in comparison.

You turned around and saw your roommate. “Does it ever occur to you that dry sponge looks a bit like cheese?” ‘Nope,’ said she. ‘I don’t care for cheese and do you have to relate everything with food? You just had your dinner.’ You shrugged, and kept on doing your dishes. ‘I am glad you got rid of the cheese though. Our fridge stinks.’ You formed an apologetic smile and promised you would take out the trash today. Your roommate proceeded to her room; you finished the dishes, put the sponge near the sink to dry itself. “I still think dry sponge looks a bit like cheese.” You said to yourself. Nobody in the kitchen, you walked slowly back to the room with your rough hands still slightly hurt from the stimulation of detergent.