Gail

This doll, with one disfigured eye, speaks to me. We are related. I rescue deformed or abused animals, dolls and teddy bears. ### He was an understudy puppet in the movie “Lili” starring Leslie Caron and Mel Ferrer (1953) for both Carrot Top and Golo, the Giant. Leslie Caron contemplates suicide at the carnival by climbing a tall ladder. Mel Ferrer, who is handicapped with a leg injury, sees what she is about to do, gets her to come down the ladder by talking to her through his puppets. She then works for him interacting with the puppets as though they are alive. In one scene Leslie Caron forces Mel Ferrer to interact with her by grabbing his hands and forcing him to see he is hiding living by living only through the puppets. ### When the carnival closes, this puppet/doll is abandoned. A child finds him and takes him home. The puppet no longer has strings attached to him; he is now a full-time doll. ### The doll strikes a chord in my heart. It may look frightening to others, to me he seems lonely and in need of love. And like a puppet or a doll, I too lived like Mel Ferrer’s character in “Lili” behind a scrim growing up and was very lonely. ### My brother Stuart was born when I was 17 months old. He had long eyelashes and lovely olive skin. My father became enraged with him as a young child and would beat him. I witnessed one such occasion. ### Rena was born when I was 8 years old with the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck. Our mother realized she was not a normal baby immediately and took to bed for two weeks. Rena was blind, severely mentally and physically retarded. She also was a happy baby. Finally she was two years old; our parents put her in Willowbrook State Institution in Staten Island. ### Stuart decapitated my favorite doll. She had blue eyes that blinked and a porcelain head. For days I walked around clutching her until my parents took her away. I keep looking at flea markets and antique stores for a replacement. ### This discarded doll with only one good eye reminds me of Rena. I could not help her or Stuart (who committed suicide in 1975), but I can give this doll a good loving home. ### I once rescued a teddy bear at the bottom of the heap in a toy store at Fells Point, Maryland. I named her “Hyacinth” because she is pink and that is my middle name. She has a 3” “scar” down her back and one broken leg. I took Hyacinth to the Doll Hospital on 62nd Street and Lexington Avenue (no longer in business). “How much to fix her back,” I asked the owner. “$25.00.” “I’ll keep her as she is.” She sits on the chair in my studio apartment with the others. ### I rescued a little stuffed chipmunk who was sitting on the floor near a fireplace in a gift store at Port Jefferson, New York for $1.00. He is sitting on my night table and when I get very upset I rub his back for good luck. ###This doll, my other doll (similar but not the same as the porcelain doll) and the stuffed animals including a Raggedy Ann all represent my “family.” I am now facing life where films and TV stories are make believe and I can make contact and let people get close to me. ### If I win this doll and he belongs to me, I will name him “Stuart.”