It's all Barbie's fault.

A couple weeks ago I sat down and read a slim volume about self-sabatoge. Seemed a good topic for someone who despite the devotion of lots of time and lots of money still has problems sticking with a weight loss plan. The content was pretty good and it focused on the fact that the way your parents were raised left them with a set of neuroses and idiosyncracies that affected the way they raised you. Basically they're damaged and the damage is transmitted to you - not on purpose but inevitably.

Then I read a current best seller that included the metaphor that children are like a sheet of glass you are installing. Even if you are very good and very careful, you leave fingerprints.

After that there was the BMW. SIL bought the BMW SUV for $35,000 and even though I don't and have never wanted a BMW I became exceedingly jealous. When I plowed through the emotional content I came to the conclusion that it wasn't the thing I coveted but her apparent ability to be so freaking impractical about money (she makes and has, far less money than me). But I was raised by parents who were children in the depression and trained carefully not to be impractical.

Follow that with last weekend when I was out shopping at the antique mall with my buddy R. We saw several unopened packages of Barbie clothes circa the early 60's. Outfits for Barbie and Midge. I pointed it out to R. and mentioned that I had a Midge growing up. Because my sister got Barbie, I couldn't have her too.

My life was full of things like that. I am 2 years younger than my sister. When things were bought they were bought one for each. As tykes, we were often dressed alike and asked if we were twins. But as we got older everything was bought one for each but different for each. Because she was older, she was given the first choice item. If we got coats hers was pink, mine was blue no matter what I wanted. She got Barbie, I got her friend Midge. She got Ken, I got his friend Alan. It was like that for a number of years.

Add to that the fact that her best friend's mother babysat. In the morning my mother would drop us at her best friend's house where they would play and I would watch. Then they would go to school and I'd watch soap operas with Mrs A. In the afternoons they'd come home and play and I'd watch. Every school day for 2 years.

There's nothing intentionally hurtful in any of that. From their perspective it was really all very practical. Intellectually I can say that, but emotionally I guess I haven't progressed all that far from wanting my own damn Barbie.

So I'm torn between that ingrained need to be responsible and that childish desire for life's Barbie's. Maybe that's why I over eat - Food is practical, you have to have it. Except for junk food runs, no one questions food buying. On the other hand I don't rein myself in. I indulge in more chocolate because when you want chocolate - carrots are Midge.