The Gorge House: The Dolls

 

Granny never gave presents at Christmas, but she was very generous at birthdays, and each child could approach her, about a week before the Big Day, and remind her, ” I’m going to be five next Thursday. ”
Granny would unbend from her usual rather austere dignity: “What would you like this year, dear?” Always the answer would be “Oh, a doll, please, Granny.” The younger Aunts would be amused: “Surely between you and Connie you’ve got enough dolls by now?”
But no, it had to be a doll, and it always was. Always on the birthday there was this big box with the longed-for doll inside. This year it had a head of tight brown curls and a mischievous expression; it was dressed in a blue romper. “What are you going to call him?” asked the Aunts. “Violet”‘ I answered, having dreamt of a Violet all week.

Auntie Lilian and Phyllis were delighted. “But don’t you see, it’s a boy doll.” I looked more closely. Yes, definitely it was a boy. “All right, then, Charlie Violet.” And Charlie Violet he remained, over the years, until his curls became matted and sparse, and his face a mass of bumps and wrinkles, not much left of his nose.

Connie and I were the proprietors of a doll orphanage. We were not always scrupulously fair as care-givers to the unfortunate dolls we looked after, in fact we were downright discretionary. Connie was the headmistress; her name was “Mrs. Sauerkraut,” and I, even less imaginatively, was “Miss Sourpuss”.

Making Stories for the Dolls Clip

Our dollhouse was the entire top floor of the Gorge House, the attic, which had been plastered and linoed, but no partitions for separate rooms. There were two dormers, however, with casement windows, which served as kitchen and bedroom. There was also a terrifying door which led to an unfinished portion of the attic, all exposed joists and spider webs. We furnished our doll orphanage with whatever came to hand – a few bits of doll furniture such as cribs, etc., a miniature chest of drawers; and for the rest, we improvised with boxes and imagination. We made a piano from a practice keyboard chart which came with Connie’s music book, we made cupboards out of wooden Japanese Orange boxes, and tables out of apple crates.

                                                                                     About the Attic

The Attic Clip

Mrs. Sauerkraut had a daughter Sylvia. Some school friends who probably couldn’t stand them because they were so ugly had handed down Sylvia and Clare to us. They were large “life-size” dolls, with composition heads and painted hair and features, and stiffly-stuffed cloth bodies. Sylvia was a frightful prig. She was pampered outrageously by her mother, and was selfish enough to take full advantage of her privileged status. She was always dressed in ruffley party clothes, even had patent-leather baby shoes. She had yellow plaits glued on by Connie, made from a skein of yellow darning wool, and glasses made out of the wires the paperboy tied up the Times with. She was insufferable. Her counterpart, Clare, was exploited for all she was worth, which admittedly wasn’t much. She was slow-witted and clumsy, always getting blamed for everything that went wrong. She worked, hard, in the kitchen, doing all the cooking and cleaning, and never got to go on any outings or take piano lessons, like darling Sylvia. Under it all, however, she had the soul of a poet; in fact she was a poet. At the annual Christmas Concert she would surprise everyone by reciting one of her own poems. How about this:

I like cooking, I think it’s lots of fun,
And every time I do it right, I always get a bun.

I like cooking, I do it quite a lot,
And every time I do I right, I get to lick the pot.

For once, Clare was in her glory.

In all I must have had over a dozen dolls at any one time. If a doll wore out, parts of it were recycled. One well-meaning Aunt once gave us a beautiful china doll with a glorious mane of lovely nut-brow human hair. Of course it didn’t survive a week in our rough hands, in fact it was so short-lived it never had a name. But its hair lived on, and became the crowning (indeed the only) glory of Bluebell, who was so old and decrepit no one knew where she came from. Her cloth body had become so limp that it had to be bolstered up by a miniature sample corset some Aunt had finagled from a lingerie shop. Wearing her corset, with her hair newly curled and styled by Connie, Bluebell had a certain dignity about her, but for a fateful failing. Bluebell had Fits. At any moment, without warning or provocation, she could be writhing around on the floor, foaming at the mouth. Poor Bluebell, whenever she had been so indiscreet as to indulge in one of her Fits, always at an awkward moment, would be severely punished by her supervisors. But somehow she never learned; punish her as we would, Bluebell persisted in having her Fits.

Who else lived in our orphanage? Shirley Temple, of course. Nice enough at heart, but a born clotheshorse, and vain – always primping her golden curls in a hand mirror. Charlie Violet was greatly smitten by her, and would have done anything to gain her regard, but she was too career-minded to bother with a nobody like him. Little did she know what a gem she was rejecting. There was a Patsy, I remember. A cheap doll, in every sense, famous only for having fallen out of the attic window and survived with only a crack in her skull, much bandaged. And there was Heidi, a handmade Swiss maiden, who was so thin and waif-like, and so ethereal in expression, that anything could send her into a terror, whereat she would crawl into the suitcase she always carried with her, crawl into her suitcase without even opening it! Obviously a refugee from war-torn Europe.

But I’ve saved the best for the last. Honeysuckle, ah, my sweet little Honeysuckle! She was Charlie’s little sister, and he guarded her fiercely. Severely handicapped, she often lost one or more of her arms and legs (made of rubber, they could easily be twisted off, particularly by an older brother). She was a game little thing, however, and crawled and hopped after the others with unquenchable cheerfulness full of mischief and affection, she was everybody’s favorite. I don’t believe she ever learned to talk, but she could get her message across anyhow. Through thick and thin, Honeysuckle was always there; she was always the best doll.

The Secret Lives of Dolls Clip

These dolls led a very interesting life. When we had school friends or cousins over to play, they couldn’t understand why we were not interested in dressing and undressing our dolls, and fussing with their hair. Well, we did that too, of course, but the main object of our play was the running soap opera of the doll’s lives. Never a dull moment. Once, when Chris was not busy on a rainy afternoon, they all went for a bus ride, the bus being ingeniously constructed out of odd bits of furniture. Of course, Charlie was the driver, and as he didn’t have his license, a horrible accident occurred. Blood everywhere, and scattered limbs. Bluebell, of course, did her thing, as did Heidi, and Sylvia went completely to pieces, hysterically blaming everyone for everything. It was up to the injured Charlie to effect an heroic rescue, after which the orphanage was turned into a hospital, Clare taking on the duties of nurse on top of her usual chores. These adventures would be written up by Connie and me in the evenings, and illustrated in blank-paged exercise books. We used to lie awake at night, planning the next day’s installment. Our imaginations were fertile; some of their adventures were pretty incredible. You remember Sylvia’s piano and elocution lessons; well, when the ladies were out at their weekly bridge parties, Charlie Violet would sneak into the music room and play the piano any chance he got. Of course the ladies squashed anything like this when Sylvia ratted on him, but nonetheless, one day a gentleman passing on the street below was so arrested by the quality of Charlie’s playing that he made inquiries, and, finding that the boy was a poor orphan, had detectives put on the trail. After a long search it was finally revealed that Charlie was none other than the long lost son of the renowned pianist Paderewsky! The great man eventually came to the orphanage, where of course the ladies fawned over him, trying to get him to audition Sylvia. A joyful reunion took place between father and son, and then, alas, the famous musician left to continue his career, leaving Charlie behind to fare how he might, and a new adventure would begin.

We had two friends who were sympathetic to our way of playing dolls, or at least admiring.hey were Joan and Betty-May Bird, although Betty-May hardly counted, being much too young. Joan and Betty-May had a goathouse in their back yard, but no goats, and one summer we were allowed to clean it up to make a summer cottage for the dolls. We washed down all the walls and windows, even planted nasturtiums by the door. The Bird’s elder sister, Tiny, worked in the paint department at Eaton’s. She donated a sample book of wallpaper patterns, which we pasted on the walls. Once we had set up house nicely, though, the dolls enjoyed a rather leisurely summer. We were too busy with other things in the warm weather, so the dolls languished in the goathouse until the end of summer, when they returned to their active life in the attic.

The Neighbour’s Summer House Clip

The dolls were central to our lives. Everything we did was related in some way to the dolls. The stories we read and news events, found their way into their adventures. We learned to knit, to make patchwork quilts, and sew little dresses for our dolls. Connie especially enjoyed messing around with the hair of those who had any. I guess in some way we were preparing for our future; we both had large and lively families.

Next:

The Gorge House: Seasons