I am a rag doll.

My face is painted pretty, and I am propped in the corner with my head flopped askew. Why should I be animated when there is nothing I can do? I sit and wait for the next time you come and lift me up, and swing me around, and toss me down.

You curl around me every night and tuck your arm into my waist, I fit myself beside you and you almost don't notice I am there. But if I move, you whimper, and you do not understand that I must pee, or roll over. Sometimes I feel I am lumps on the mattress grown into with long sleep habits.

I remember making a rag doll for a kid in my neighborhood when I was younger. The limbs did not match and the smile was sewn on crooked, and the clothes barely went on and off, and the hair flopped all over. I worried if the kid would notice or care. I got a quick thank you, but nothing more. And I did not snoop in the bin to look for the doll. Some days, I wish I did know what happened to it.

Some days, I know that doll is me.

We don't have any pink in the living room. Funny what you notice when you don't sit in your usual spots.  ¶ 1:09 PM