Dare... to be different

Reading the Dare Wright biography and her Lonely Doll books has me looking at dolls. I'm no collector, I only have what was left over from childhood, but they are intriguing.  Perhaps if I had more room I'd be inclined to pick up a few here and there, um, like say these Mad Men "Barbies".  I still don't care too much for the "Kens". In fact it still bugs me that my Ken doll has been naked since the mid-late 70's and I did promise us both I'd pick up an outfit somewhere but it's been almost two years and I have yet to even look at Ken doll clothes.

I also looked at Lenci dolls and saw that they issued a Lonely Doll replica a few years back for $1400 or so. But the original Lenci doll Dare used was from the 1920's.  It was Dare who replaced the doll's mohair wig with her own hair. She cute her own chignon to create a ponytail for the doll. She made other alterations to the doll, named Edith, to make her look more 1950's than 1920's.

Reading the biography on Dare from today's perspective, I don't view her as unstable. She was somewhat poorly socialized, no fault of her own. However, despite being a tad socially inept, she managed to have quite the glamorous social life. I really like this person who once lived on earth with her trunk of  hand sewn costumes, doll and awesome ideas for children's stories. She was multi-talented, so pretty and just a very interesting person. I really hate coming to the end of her biography and wish there was more out there on her. She was an individual at a time when it was difficult to stray from the ordinary.

Today thousands of adults flock to toy shows and comic-cons, investing thousands of dollars in action figures, models, toys and comics. Today thousands of adults dress up in costumes all the time and not just to attend Renaissance Fairs and comic-cons but make it part of their lifestyle year round. This freedom would have been well welcomed by those like Dare Wright and even Edie Beale of Grey Gardens who could have maybe had easier adult lives had they been born decades later.

It is cool that adults today can dress up, collect toys with nothing more than a few nerd jokes in their way. Growing up, becoming an adult doesn't mean you have to put away the scissors and glue or visits to the toy and comic book stores. It also doesn’t mean that you need to cease with all the wonder. There is still tons of childlike wonder to fill an adult life, especially if you didn't take many physics and science classes.teehee. So wonder your brains out and then go look it up. Adults don't know everything because they stop wondering (and looking stuff up).

All this being said, for my birthday I wouldn't mind receiving the  Joan or Betty doll as a gift, along with having a petting zoo delivered to my yard, a giant ice cream cake, a bubble machine and live music by the Polkadillos. That would be fun, the only thing that could trump a day like that would be time travel back to golden age of the vending machine.