September 21, 2015 - 16:45
I have always LOVED to make up stories. I’d create magical worlds where the hero would fight some sort of mega-monster and save the day. I’d create worlds like our own where a character, usually much like myself but what I considered cooler, would do all sorts of cool stuff and go all sorts of cool places. Now a days I either keep these stories in my head or every once in a while write them down, but when I was little I would act them out, either with toys or people. Sometimes I acted out my stories on my own but often I played with another, often my younger sister.
One of my favorite toys to use to act out my stories were Barbies and I had a lot of Barbies. Two of my favorite were this one who was a spy with sneakers that turned into roller skates (like Heelys except with 4 wheels instead of 1) and another who was a fairy that glowed when I pushed a button and had detachable wings. I used to make them be BFFs that had to stop foil some evil villain’s master plan and save some poor kidnapped Kelly doll. As I got older they would often times save some poor kidnapped Ken doll.
Another of my favorite toys to use would be Polly Pockets. I loved to dress them up and give them secret identities that only I knew. I often made up a story for them to follow and played it out with my younger sister. There was one stoy in particular we often did, where there were two neighboring Polly Pocket villages and one was good and the other was evil and the evil village would do something evil and the good village would have to stop the evil village. And when doing this I often made my sister, against her will, play the bad Pollys, because I wanted to be the hero.
Sometimes, especially when I had friends over, we would dress up in all sorts of costumes and parade around the house and yard enacting all sorts of scenarios. We would be Jedis, fighting some evil Jedi master and battling with lightsabers. We would be wizards fighting the Death Eaters. We would be pop stars living a glamorous life in Hollywood. I would be a teacher and they would be my students.
I have always loved making up stories. I believe that being creative and imaginative when you are little is important because it hones your skills for adult hood. I am so glad I had the chance to make up and enact my own stories as a child.