Dorothy

On the day I turned six, I got a new neighbor.  By the profound levels of logic innate in all six year olds, I had deduced that because this new person arrived on my birthday, she somehow belonged to me.  She wasn't exactly what I would have asked for as a birthday gift, but she was new and therefore I had to investigate.

My new neighbor wasn't just old...she was ancient, like grandmother ancient.  She came from a time when televisions had hand-cranks and cars were made mostly of wood.  Had I known what a hobbit was at six years old, she would have reminded me of one; short, round, with rosy cheeks and a Rankin Bass cartoon smile.

This would be Dorothy.  But with white hair.  Minus the furry feet.  And the pipe.

She came included with 2 cats, an old man in a recliner, one of those old wooden hand-crank televisions, and her very own set of furniture.  As soon as the moving truck was unloaded, the empty apartment next to mine instantly transformed into the largest doll house known to mankind, and I wanted to play with it.

After the quick introductions which involved my mom's half embarrassed apology for my intrusion into our neighbor's new domicile, and my neighbor's unwise decision to say I was welcome to visit any time, I quickly set about making interior design suggestions and asking the million questions that any six year old would ask when surrounded by unopened boxes on her birthday.

Dorothy and I quickly became the  best of friends, which was not as surprising as one might think. Dorothy was not like most adults who have arbitrary rules for how children must behave indoors.  In fact, Dorothy had almost no rules.  I could

Blow bubbles in her house:

Bring my friends over any time:

Color with crayons and eat lunch *at the same time*:

put doll clothes on her cats:

AND, most importantly, turn her dining room furniture into barnyard animals using cut up pieces of construction paper.

This last part stands out most in my mind.  My best friend helped me to create the most amazing creature in the world using Dorothy's dining room chair and construction paper.  We cut out paper horse parts, taped them to the chair,

and named the chair "Poopsie."  The name came from the fact that attached to Poopsie's rear end with tape was an abstract clump of brown construction paper. I'm sure you can make your own deductions from there.  Poopsie resided in Dorothy's house for as long as I can remember.  Years went by and still there was faithful old Poopsie, ready for adventure, and for sitting on when food was served at the table for her creators. Poopsie's co-creators remain best friends to this day, and we still reminisce about Dorothy and Poopsie.


Later on I would find out that Dorothy never married, never had children, and the creepy man in the recliner was not her husband, but in fact, her older brother.  In retrospect, this would explain why she allowed me, a child, to do all sorts of crazy things in her house.  She had no idea of the consequences of giving a child arts and crafts supplies and an unchecked freedom of her home.

Still, I don't think Dorothy minded any of the crazy things I would do in her home.  In fact, I think she was proud of me because she was always happy with everything I did, and often rewarded me with sandwiches made with Miracle Whip.  Even as a small child I was too fond of Dorothy to ever tell her that I hated Miracle Whip.  I ate the sandwiches as though they were laced with crack.

I lost touch with Dorothy a few years after I moved to a galaxy far far away. Hey, the distance between five states can be measured in light years to a kid that regularly fell asleep on the ride to Wal-mart.

Boys and school got in the way I suppose, but I never forgot about her.  Eventually the letters just stopped coming, and me being the naive person I can sometimes be, figured that she was just as busy as I was. (As if old people in assisted living homes have booked schedules).  I put it out of my mind, but a few years back, when I remembered that the interweb is all powerful, I looked her up in the social security death index. Lo and behold, Dorothy had died at age 79 in 2004 just 2 weeks before my birthday.

Dorothy was an awesome lady. I could feel all guilty about having lost touch with someone to the point of not knowing they had died five years prior, but I'm pretty sure she would just come back as a zombie and scold me for being so negative and hard on myself.  She would do that too, because that's just how freakin cool she was.  Poopsie zombie would be with her, but instead of telepathically begging me for construction paper carrots, Poopsie Zombie would want construction paper brains instead.

And Dorothy, well...she'd probably invite me over for a brain sandwich with cheese and Miracle Whip, and I would probably oblige. You never turn down an undead person's invitation for lunch when you're not actually on the menu.  Besides, I don't have the heart to tell her I still don't like Miracle Whip.