Seventeen years ago, I was living on the East side of Milwaukee, Wisconsin on a fairly busy street corner for foot traffic. Winters in Milwaukee are especially cold because of the wind whipping off of the lake just blocks from where I was living. One week I noticed a doll figure in my very small shred of yard, face-down in the snow. I didn't pick it up at first, but waited 3 days to see if perhaps in belonged to someone that had dropped it. On the third day, I decided to pick it up.I have always had a strange gift for being "charmed" (as my friend Casey once put it). I am a finder of many things. I have eyes that zero in on details several feet or distances away. I'd like to say I just have a natural eye for detail, but after instances like this, I feel that my gift is quite a magical one. Objects, fetishes, charms and the like are all tiny messages to me. Little mirrors to look within and hold a key to my own locked perceptions about life.
When I picked her up I remember getting a flush of heat over my face and butterflies in my stomach. I touched her ivory face, her seal skin coat, her leathered booties and of course smiled at the little smiling baby sitting on her back in a papoose. I thought to myself... "Did you just hike all the way from Alaska and end up face down in my yard? Where have you been? Why are you here?"Dolls always really meant something magical to me. As I stated in my previous post, I would play for hours with my dolls, as a child, making up elaborate romantic stories and adventures. After living in Milwaukee I briefly lived in New Orleans and even made voodoo dolls for the shops I worked in, in the french quarter.
So I decided to keep this gift that was given to me by the universe, knowing I always wanted her close on my alter. I knew she had secrets for me and one day, she would tell me. I never named her.
Fast forward to the fall of 2013.
I was planning my next work trip. I take an annual trip to Seattle for the worlds only burlesque convention, Burlycon around oct/nov. Since I was already going to be out there, and since I was renting my place out in NYC, I needed somewhere else to go... another place to tour for performing, teaching my classes and selling my accessories. For a long time I was gathering some mad love for the ladies of Anchorage Alaska and dropped the head lady, Lola Pistola a line expressing my interest. Immediately she got back to me excited because her troupe VivaVoom Brr-lesque was screening a movie I was in called the Burlesque Assassins and she thought it would be an excellent idea to have me headline the screenings and come up to teach classes and also sell my flowers. I told her about my Native American studies and told her I had a doll to bring up, to get some info on. The girls all knew how much it meant to me to soak up as much of the Alaskan Native culture as I could and they all came together and started making plans to take me around to get my fix.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Alaska-Native-Heritage-Center/36670628470?rf=246666755376276
I brought my doll. Again, My heart was just popping out of my chest and my excitement like a child, smiling from ear to ear. I was nervous, though. Despite my draw to these aboriginal cultures, I have always been really conscious of perhaps being "too much" or too excited for the people and having them think I'm some crazy white girl. So we arrived and got our passes from a beautiful, warm lady at the desk... and they went into to the exhibits to turn on the lights for us. Frankie asked me if I wanted to ask the desk lady about the doll, but i just said, "hmm, not yet".
We entered the exhibits and started to walk around through cases of primitive tools, elaborately painted and beaded headdresses and adornments. They were all in different sections for the different Native tribes that are from the Alaskan area. And when we came through some of the cases we came upon two women sitting and making sun catchers and moccasins. I said sheepishly said Hi and asked them if I could ask them a question, that I didn't mean to bother.... I pulled out my doll and asked the older of the two ladies if she could tell me anything about this doll. I told her how I came to have her and how long I had her. She said; "Ahhhh so you brought her back home for a visit, she looks pretty beat up!" And proceeded to tell me my doll definitely came from the north and that she was most likely Inupiat. She told me about the walrus tusk faces, the seal skin coats, the arctic squirrel fur around the head and noted how beat up the poor dear looked. I laughed saying, "Well she had a long trip from Alaska, ending up face down in my yard!" She remarked at the threading and said she was most likely 40 to 50 years old because she was made with floss and not sinew (floss was brought around to the native peoples in the 60s/70s to promote dental hygiene, but they also liked to use it sa thread). Also she noted signs of sewing machine use for the body. And I asked... "But what was she for?" She told me that the dolls were made to teach children the roles of the families and most likely there was a male or father that was once part of this set.
All of a sudden it hit me. All along I had been carrying around a magical symbol of single-motherhood. I'lll tell you now that I have always had some serious issues with this dynamic. My mother was an angry, tired, unloving single mother and my childhood was quite lonely and somewhat hellish because of it. I was suicidal once at 10 years old and again in my early teens because I could not, for the life of me, understand why I had been created. Since those 17 years have gone by... I have had many relationships gone by and was even married once, which failed. It failed because I felt myself becoming my single mother with a child who was actually my husband. (no offense to him, regardless of both of our very real issues surrounding this dynamic, I had this energy to work out and understand. I love him now as one of my very best friends for life. We learned so much about our selves and about love, I have no regrets.) I was angry, I pushed him away... I lacked the patience that I never got from my mother. But, now, I couldn't help but wonder if I had been magically enforcing some sort of MY single mother energy on myself? It was a huge wake up call. How can I expect to be in love one day and have a happy family while carrying around a single mother who holds all the burdens of loneliness and exhaustion?
So in my mind, I came to a solution. I am looking for a mate for her. I looked everywhere around the Alaska fur trading posts, the Alaskan Native Medical Center Gift shop, Black Elk Trading... I just couldn't seem to find a mate that matched her. I saw over a hundred dolls that week. They were too flamboyant, too small, or I didn't like the expression on the carved faces... none of them spoke to me as a mate suited for her to complete this family.
It really made me think about my own choosing of a mate. far too often I have been hasty in my choices, too trusting... I've ended up with so many failed attempts at love and realize I haven't put enough magic into the thought and dream of a real stable loving marriage or family model.
I feel now like maybe I might want to make her a mate. I can design him just perfectly for her, I can dress her up with my scraps of fur and magical items I have collected. Or I can just take it easy and see if a man doll magically shows up for her. We can dream that dream together. I am in no rush for love. I know I will know what to do for her when I feel ready to make a family for myself. For now, I look at my single mother doll, the way I look at my own mother... with compassion and empathy and love that conquers all the obstacles of life.
Black Elk Trading was my last stop to look for answers about my doll... the desk clerk called over a sweet little smiling man with few teeth in his mouth... She handed him the doll and asked him if he knew anything... His eyes lighted up as if he was a child again and he said "OHHHHH, My Grandma used to make dolls JUST like this one! She is from Wales!!!!" He was smiling so bright and holding the doll as if it was his new born baby... With pride and joy in his eyes. It makes me tear up just to think I brought her back just to give him that moment of pure childlike reminiscence. He was so sweet, I teared up a little just remembering this moment.
Right after that moment...In the library section at Black Elk, Lola found a book on eskimo dolls... sure enough... there was our girl in the SAME style as my doll... Inupiat from Wales.
Bless this little doll of mine. I am gracious to all of those who hear this story or have helped me with this little part of my journey. The things I learned about myself and about the people of Alaska were truly touching.
I spent other days that week between my shows going to the Museums and various antique stores with the ladies of Vivavoom Brrrrlesque. They were amazing on all levels. Such beautiful enthusiastic spirits, expressing themselves with love, beauty, humor and joy. They were excited and present to learn from me and be adorned in my flowers. This is the world I love in. I never had much connection with my family (until now), so these ladies, goddesses across the world are the tribe I have helped make my own. If you are ever in anchorage Check them out! https://www.facebook.com/vivavoom?fref=ts
Here I am in the Anchorage paper, announcing the show I was featured in:
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