My Mother's Paper Doll

Represents our generational strength

I started and ended Paperdolls & Cowboy Boots by writing about my mother's paper doll. The one my grandmother made for her when she was a little girl.

A tear could have washed her away. In the attic, underneath layers of dust, I found her. I carefully brushed the dirt from her face. She was watercolored by my grandmother’s hand, evidently for my mother when she was a little girl. The floor creaked as I walked past some tarnished brass. I took her away from the dark attic. On-ly then could I see her beauty.

An antique paper doll, salvaged from a hundred-year-old home. Her hair is blond and her eyes hazel—like my mother’s. Like mine. I am a 32-year-old woman now living in the home where my mother was raised. I am as old as my mother was when she bore me. I wonder, if my mother had kept this doll, would things have been different for her?

I’ll keep her. My life is different. She’s fragile, mere paper and watercolors. For-gotten in a dusty attic for decades. I am going to display her, protected, under glass. I want to display her resilience. Somewhere where I can always see her. To remind me to never forget.

Paperdolls & Cowboy Boots ends with my mother's paper doll. I intentionally mis-spelled paper dolls in the title. I connected the word to symbolize that we are all connected. My grandmother's work for my mother doesn't belong exclusively to the silo of our family. Its strength and resilience belongs to us all. For we are all connected.

Happy Mother's Day