Playing with dolls?

Usually, when I need to think through an idea or a plot point, I take a walk and "have a conversation" with my characters. I explore what they need to convey, what the consequences are, what a discussion might look like. Over the weekend, I was trying to decide what sibling rivalry among three grown sisters might look like, but because it was the weekend, my Dear Husband joined me, which meant I talked to HIM and not to my characters. So when I got home and sat at my computer, for whatever reason, Barbie dolls jumped into my head--as in "maybe I should act this out with my Barbies." (Except I don't have any Barbies anymore.)  

True confession time. When I was a kid, I loved playing with dolls.

Instead of resolving my plot point, my thoughts carried me away to all those people who ask me where I get my ideas from and how I find character names and traits and settings and plots and "How did you think of that?" in general. My pat answer is that I have a very active imagination--and I do. Playing with dolls might have been my first outlet. No, maybe it was the second. 

I was barely old enough to write the first time I knew I wanted to write books. I hand-wrote a story about a mother cat and her kittens (yes, I still remember!). Sent it off to Simon and Schuster (which means I must have been old enough to know how to address a letter). And boy were my parents surprised when I got that rejection letter back! But I digress...

Dolls. When you played dolls, didn't you make up a life for them? Things for them to do? Drive Ken and Barbie around in the Barbie Convertible? Dress them up for work? At the end of the day, that's what authors do. We decorate the Barbie house. We dress Barbie up for her day. We send her out with her friends. We make up things for her to do. 

I remember playing with dolls longer than some of my friends. Maybe, I still do.

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