Headphones On

i overheard somewhere that this the 20th anniversary of the cabbage patch kid. i immediately thought they were wrong. there's no way that was 20 years ago... and then i thought about it. yeah, i probably was 6.

i had a cabbage patch kid. the first one though i got for christmas sometime in the early 80s. i vaguely remember my brother being mad that my mother had made him stand in line at the toy store for hours to get me a cabbage patch premie. it had a tuft of dirty blond hair on the top of it's plastic head and was wearing a yellow dress like thing. i'm sure i gave it a name but i've no idea anymore what it would have been.

a few years later i had THE cabbage patch kid. it was after we had moved to chicago. her name was beatrice. i remember this so distinctly because my dad worked for 'beatrice foods'. she had dark hair and pigtails. i never undid the pigtails because on previous dolls i had undone the hair and was never able to get it back to that 'fresh from the factory' look. so beatrice's hair never left those pigtails. she was COOL as far as cabbage patch kids go. she didn't wear dumb dresses like other dolls. she had overalls and mary janes. i took her everywhere. then one year as a present she got a bear suit. it was CUTE as all get out. a combo teddy bear/cabbage patch kid! can you imagine? as mentioned earlier i took her everywhere... and our most frequent destination was the park. the park was half a block away. we had a tire swing and a field and big wooden junglejim like thing. i would go to the park with beatrice everyday. this really wasn't a big park. it was rather secluded in our neighborhood. only the kids from the neighborhood would go... not like a big park that attracted people from around town.

one day in my excitement to get home... i left her there. she had been sitting patiently on the bench waiting and watching me play. when i realized my error a few hours later i went back to the park to get her. i was devastated when i couldn't find her. i knew i'd left her on the bench. she wasn't on the bench. i'm sure i ran home crying. no beatrice! no bearsuit!

i figured that nick had taken her to do all sorts of evil things. nick was our neighborhood bully. he was always doing mean things to me and lisa (my best friend in the neighborhood). nick is related to a rather famous hockey player and never had any qualms about telling everyone this. i didn't even know what hockey was and could care less but it does set up the rest of the story.

i never forgot about my favorite doll. i missed her always but the years went on as they do. when i was in high school nick joined our hockey team. as he and his brothers were always playing in the street by the park, he was rather good... the star of our team. that famous hockey player he is related to got him into the ontario junior league... and nick left high school to go play 'professionally'.

i've always sort of vaguely followed his career... particularly after developing a love for the game. nick came to signify the EVIL GOONY hockey players i DO NOT LIKE. nick was drafted by an nhl team and was sent to the minor leagues to develop. when i was living in grand rapids his team played ours. i went to the game... to find out he was scratched from the lineup with an ankle injury. after the game i had to wait for my friend who worked for the team... and as we are leaving who is leaving with us but a now BIG nick (6'4" or so) on crutches and some other HUGE hockey playing friend. i stopped him outside of the arena..

me: "do you remember me?"
nick: "no?"
me: "liz... i grew up around the corner... remember now?"
nick: "oh yeah"
me: "you stole my cabbage patch kid."
nick's friend: "WHAT?"
me: "when we were 8 or so, you STOLE MY CABBAGE PATCH KID"
nick: "i don't know what you're..."
nick's friend: "dude... you stole some girl's cabbage patch kid?!?"
me: "it was in a bearsuit"
nick: ...
nick's friend's: "whoa"

turn... walk away... although i wanted to kick him in the leg that wasn't bandaged up so he'd have no GOOD legs. i much prefer the torment he most likely received from the rest of the team when they found out that some girl he grew up with showed up EXPRESSLY to out him on cabbage patch kid stealing. victory!

Originally written 12.06.03