Cootie Central

I love my little Channahleh. I really do. Channahleh is my six-year-old daughter. She is very much the typical six year old girl in that she causes random destruction wherever she goes, can be very sweet when she wants to be, can manipulate adults to the point where some would give her thermonuclear weapons if they had them, and, oh yes, most of all... she loves dolls.

I remember dolls growing up. I have one sister, who is three years younger than I am. She had - and I am not exaggerating - tons of dolls. Dolls of every imaginable size and shape - Barbie dolls, Barbie-lookalike-dolls, Barbie-knockoff dolls, dolls that were being sued by Barbie for patent infringement, dolls that were snubbing their noses at Barbie over the lawsuits, etc.

However, I've found from my sister and speaking to other alleged females, that many such dolls end up in a horrible state - namely naked, with cut or frizzed out hair and sitting in the bottom of a closet collecting dust. Of course, growing up, I never got too close to the dolls - I didn't want to catch Cooties, which, to a young man, are potentially fatal (or at least might cause him to lose esteem among his peers - which is pretty much the same thing as fatal).

Anyway, to you bring you back to the present, Channahleh loves dolls. And when I say loves, I mean "won't-go-anywhere-without-them, won't-go-to-sleep-without-them, won't-eat-without-them, won't-get-have-a-tonsillectomy-unless-my-doll-gets-one-too" loves them.

A few years ago, some marketing genius came out with a new line of dolls called "American Girl" dolls. These dolls are (to my doll-untrained eye) very much like Barbie. The exception is that they have created some back stories for these girls, putting them in different periods of American history (one helped out with the Revolution, one helped free some slaves in the antebellum South, one was eaten by a coyote in the American Southwest, one became a moonshine runner in the prohibition-era New York City, etc.) Oh, yes, and they also cost about twice to three times as much as Barbie does.

So, naturally, whenever there is a new doll craze on the market, advertisers know that they have a mission to accomplish - get every little girl between the ages of two and ten to mercilessly harass their parents until they give in and buy them the doll. A friend of mine told me a story that happened to a friend-of-a-friend of hers where her daughter held her favorite crystal bowl hostage until she got her American Girl doll. Another case involved a child who took automotive classes and uninstalled her father's carburetor until the doll was delivered.

Fortunately for me, Channahleh was never the sort to do that. She doesn't threaten - she just whips out "the eyes." You know what I mean, don't you? The big "sad puppy dog" eyes that look to say "Daddy, if you don't give me what I want, why, I just know (sob) that the whole world is going to end right now. You don't want the world to end now, do you Daddy (sniff)?"

Well, truth be told, her birthday was approaching. I really wanted nothing to do with getting this doll - I had too many traumatic images of naked dolls floating in the bathtub growing up to want to deal with it. Fortunately, my wife agreed to take her to the American Girl store to get her doll - sparing me a trip to the American Girl store; the place that is no doubt Cootie Central.

Alas, my luck was short lived. "Honey," my wife started the other day, "Channahleh wants to get a new outfit for her doll. She's even saved up her own money for it." I knew giving her an allowance would come back to bite me one day. "Since you work right near the American Girl store, can you please go get the outfit for her? She wants the Marisol ballet outfit."

I protested, I pleaded, I pulled out every excuse I could think of. I couldn't go because I only had ten minutes for lunch; I couldn't go because my company (which has nothing to do with dolls) was a competitor of American Girl; I couldn't go because I didn't have my Cootie shots; I couldn't go because there were huge packs of wolves roaming through midtown Manhattan. She wasn't buying any of it; I was off to the American Girl store. Of course, buying it online didn't occur to me until after it was all over. D'oh!

I walked into the place feeling like a salmon at a bear convention. I nervously walked around the store looking for Marisol's ballet outfit. I certainly didn't want to ask anyone where to find it since (a) they might think I was some weirdo for wanting a doll's outfit for little girls (b) I might catch Cooties from them. On the other hand, I was determined to limit my exposure to the Cooties by spending as little time as possible. Carefully walking so as to avoid stepping on any of the little girls that were littered around the store and their insane mothers who were simply reliving their own childhood, I eventually found the required outfit. I was almost afraid to touch it at first, for fear of catching Cooties here at Cootie Central. However, in the end, I was determined that my love for my daughter meant more to me than getting the Cooties. Besides, I probably had some immunity anyway - after all, I'd been exposed to Cooties plenty of times as a child and never really got it. I grabbed the outfit, marched straight to the register, paid for it in cash (I wasn't going to have this traceable to me by credit card!) and hurried out of the store.

I'm currently posting from the Cootie ward of Beth Israel hospital. The doctors tell me I'll be fine in another week or two, after the testosteronectomy.