Headless Barbie Doll

The most memorable birthday present I've ever given...

Every week another journal writer, John Scalzi, gives everybody a journal assignment to do.  This weekend's assignment is: Share the most memorable birthday present you've ever gotten -- or given.

I figured I would get in trouble if I wrote about the most memorable present I ever received.  Somebody would feel left out.  So I decided to write about the most memorable birthday present I've ever given...

Now, John asked for the most memorable, not the best.  I gave this present to my Dad.  I am sure it was not the best present he ever got, but perhaps the most memorable.  If he doesn't remember it, I would be surprised. 

I was about six years old.  I didn't have any money.  I wanted to give my Dad something really special.  Since I didn't have the money to buy him anything, and the time for him to open gifts was fast approaching, I frantically searched the house for a gift.  And then I found it.  The perfect gift.  A naked Barbie Doll.  And I popped the head off.  I proudly presented it to my older sister Therese and immediately she said, "Oh, that is a stupid idea.  He wouldn't want that."  "Oh yes he would,"  I replied.  "What is he going to do with a headless Barbie Doll?"  "This is not a headless Barbie Doll, this is the Boogy Man."  When we were kids there was something that lived down in the playroom named the Boogy Man.  See, it was kind of dark down there, so something scary lived down there.  And I imagined he must be headless.  Both my sister and my Mother tried to convince me not to give the headless Barbie to my Dad but I would have none of it.

That reminds me of the Mother's Day when I was about nine and I went to the store and bought my Mom a package of six WishNik rings with glowing pink hair...