To My Granddaughter
Redding
11/07/2010
ENG103
Essay 3
“Barbie Doll” page 439
To: My Granddaughter
I thought of you when I read this and I have had these thoughts so often in these almost four years since you came into my life. You know I always tell you the truth, unless I lie about a dead cat on the road being a raccoon so you won’t feel as bad. I’ve taught you gentleness and love, kindness and selflessness in a world where you have so little of all these. I will keep trying to give you all I can to make your world better, to give you a haven to call yours when other hearts don’t understand the way yours beats. You call me Grammy, and you will never know we are related not at all by blood, but a heart doesn’t care what blood flows through it, all it knows is what it feels. I worry so much about you, and this poem “Barbie Doll”, portrays one of the greatest fears I have for your future…….they are laying all over the living room floor right now………..but they are everywhere else as well, right outside the door. This poem is heart- wrenching, you know. It speaks volumes of truth. They don’t think about your future as they overload you with all the “dolls”, the glittery and glitzy outfits, priming your little mind with the expectations of society, programming you early, exploiting your little girl excitement and love of dolls so that all too soon you will know what you are “supposed” to look like and how you are “supposed” to act. You have brown eyes and brown hair. You don’t have blonde hair and blue eyes. Yes, you are beautiful. But will you be beautiful enough? Will you be good enough? Good enough for what, you ask. Well, for them, I suppose. People. Will you feel that you are less than? You will never measure up, that’s what you will say to the mirror. I’m so afraid for you, my little one. That’s why I buy the camouflage jacket, the toy toolboxes and racecar sets. I want to
11/07/2010
ENG103
Essay 3
“Barbie Doll” page 439
To: My Granddaughter
I thought of you when I read this and I have had these thoughts so often in these almost four years since you came into my life. You know I always tell you the truth, unless I lie about a dead cat on the road being a raccoon so you won’t feel as bad. I’ve taught you gentleness and love, kindness and selflessness in a world where you have so little of all these. I will keep trying to give you all I can to make your world better, to give you a haven to call yours when other hearts don’t understand the way yours beats. You call me Grammy, and you will never know we are related not at all by blood, but a heart doesn’t care what blood flows through it, all it knows is what it feels. I worry so much about you, and this poem “Barbie Doll”, portrays one of the greatest fears I have for your future…….they are laying all over the living room floor right now………..but they are everywhere else as well, right outside the door. This poem is heart- wrenching, you know. It speaks volumes of truth. They don’t think about your future as they overload you with all the “dolls”, the glittery and glitzy outfits, priming your little mind with the expectations of society, programming you early, exploiting your little girl excitement and love of dolls so that all too soon you will know what you are “supposed” to look like and how you are “supposed” to act. You have brown eyes and brown hair. You don’t have blonde hair and blue eyes. Yes, you are beautiful. But will you be beautiful enough? Will you be good enough? Good enough for what, you ask. Well, for them, I suppose. People. Will you feel that you are less than? You will never measure up, that’s what you will say to the mirror. I’m so afraid for you, my little one. That’s why I buy the camouflage jacket, the toy toolboxes and racecar sets. I want to
Cited: New York: Longman, 2007. 439.