Single, independent, modern, 33-year-old Kim Revill gave her dollies to her 3-year-old niece, Abigail - now she wants them back!
It’s all my mother’s fault. If only she had left my dolls in the loft to do the Dorian Gray thing along with the odd David Sylvian 12-inch and my Starsky and Hutch annuals 1977-1979. But she’s gone for the car boot thing in a big way . I had to save them. My great plan was to pass them on to Abigail - my three year old niece and doll fancier of the highest order. I'd pretend to be her favourite, and extremely generous, Aunty, she’d play nicely with them and my children would be safe for the foreseeable future.
Only, it wasn't love at first sight. She was terrified by them. Big Doll with her dirty Billy Idol hair and wonky head (Even I was a little shocked to see that lethal index finger again - chewed to perfect sister- poking length). Tiny Tears had no eyes and, as if that wasn't bad enough, appeared to be in a permanent state of injury after someone had clearly run amok with a red felt tipped pen and the bacon scissors. And Katie Copycat creaked in a Roald Dahl Tales of the Unexpected-evil-ventriloquist’s- dummy-come-to-life’ sort of a way.
My dolls were assimilated into her 1990s beanie baby world, but this wasn't ‘play’ it was WWF wrestling. If doll years are anything like dog years, and I’m guessing they most certainly are, then my girls are entering the autumn of their lives. Don't let the babyfaces fool you. They’ll need hip replacements before too long and are far too old to be pulled about by her hair, dragged by the feet and expected to play doctors and nurses with the cast of Sesame Street. I won't tell you what I found her doing to Tiny Tears. Katie Copycat lost an arm in an incident with an egg whisk that still has me palpitating and Big Doll narrowly survived a fatal crushing after a trip to Twycross Zoo when Abigail abandoned her in the car park. I made them drive back.
Mmmm - someone was going to have to be grown up about this. Me? Me. Yes, me. I was going to get them back. There was no way she was letting them go. I was drawing up an elaborate escape plan for my would-be fugitives when my mother decided that she’d sort us out. She'd had more than enough of the tears and the shouting. ‘I remember’, she said, ‘how Kim used to play with these dolls and pretend she was married to - who was it now .. oh yes, DAVE - LEE - TRAVIS. At that moment, Chad Valley became a dark and evil place, I was whirling about in a psychologically disturbed vortex of my own invention. My dolls the results of a nightmarish coupling? Me and the Hairy Cornflake!!! I started to hyperventilate. Abigail began to smile - a knowing, triumphant smile. She waves those wretched dolls in front of me at every opportunity now with a Damien-style fervour that would give Gregory Peck a bit of a turn...
It's all been rather stressful for me but my therapist reckons that the whole DLT thing could explain much of my erratic behaviour and that as long as I avoid the children's pages of the Argos catalogue and medium wave independent radio, I’ll be just fine.
