Collecting Blues

Lately, times have been less than happy or easy. We are very close now to getting a building, and are holding fundraisers. Yet, it is easy to be discouraged.

I do my best to work on my writing, and today, I found a moment to put away some dolls and arrange them they way I wanted. It’s a small step, but it is satisfying. Storage is a necessary evil in the museum/collecting world, and we are trying to keep it all together. I always said managing a large collection of anything is like managing an office. I have read a lot of Harry Rinker’s columns in Antique Week; he, too, seems to lament that younger people are not interested in antiques or collectibles. I can’t think why not; I was introduced at a very early age. Shari Lewis wrote Things Kids Collect to inspire young collectors; the old magazine Doll Stars was aimed at kids. Somethings beg to be collected; dolls, shells, rocks, Hot Wheels, to name a few. What child doesn’t love stickers? I was busy, too, with extracurricular things, lots of dance and music lessons, art lessons, etc. I still stuck with my dolls.

As I’ve said before, we all need a passion, one Barbara Pym called something to love, or what Virginia Woolf indicated was a room of one’s own. The desire to buy dolls seems to wane for me, but somehow, I love looking at them, looking for them, arranging them. I do pick up good examples for the museum. It’s hard to leave some good dolls out there.

I read a lot on the study of material culture and collecting, including dolls. Susan Pearce’s series Collectors’ Voices is excellent, so are Kenneth Gross’s books On Dolls, and On Puppets. Susan Stewart’s On Longing is another work on the subject that is worth reading.

When the going gets tough, the tough hunt dolls or print paper dolls. We read about them, we watch trends. For example, the local thrift store’s can’t seem to keep their Cabbage Patch Kids in stock. Dolls in general seem to do well; they know me, but seldom comment. If they ask what I do with them, the clerks are impressed when I tell them about the museum.

We’ve added to papier mache Bru twins, a Sophia china head, a Kathe Kruse Boy, and SFBJ bébé and several other lovely French dolls and German characters. We keep looking.

We also keep reading. It’s important from time to time to find the person we were. For me, that meant making things, getting excited over a new book, over a new doll. It meant putting my own outfits together, and caring how I looked when I went out the door. It’s hard to give up who we were in the face of crushing responsibility, but it happens to most of us.

Try to make some time to go to that room of your own, that happy place. Dust the doll shelves, read a new doll article on something you don’t know about. Take out your needlepoint if you can. Plant some flowers; pansies do great this time of year. And remember, just breathe.