In a collection as big as Treesa's some of us dolls can get...how do I put this nicely...left to our own devices for long stretches of time. Some of the other dolls take it personally if they're ignored for too long, but I don't anymore. I know Treesa's not trying to play favorites. It's just that there's so many of us and she only has so much free time. Besides, if I hadn't been left to my own devices, I might never have found the love of my life. Here's how it happened.
I was bought in the early 2000s. Treesa's collecting style at the time was pretty much 'buy what you like'. If something caught her eye and was a good price she'd pick it up. The doll who became my girlfriend was bought around the same time I was. She didn't have a name then. Treesa called me Jimmy from the beginning because I was a photographer like Jimmy Olsen, a character from the Superman franchise. But I've heard from some of the older dolls that when Treesa was a kid only a few of them had permanent names. Treesa didn't really start trying to come up with original names for everybody until recently.
But anyway, when I first met my girlfriend she was just Picture Pockets Kira. It wasn't love at first sight, but we didn't hate each other or anything like that. It's just that it was a big collection even then, and with so many other dolls to meet it was impossible for me to get to know everybody. We would say hi when we saw each other but we weren't really even friends yet. That changed not long after Treesa did a photo shoot with me and Florida Midge.
At least, she was Florida Midge at the time. She's Jean Grayson now. Treesa named her that as sort of a comic book joke.
But anyway, before the pictures were even printed me and Jean got put away in one of the plastic storage crates that Treesa used for her dolls. Treesa didn't have enough shelf space to display all of us. She still doesn't. Now the problem with being in the crates was that they were stackable. If you were in the bottom crate you weren't going anywhere. The best way to stay sane in this situation is to talk to the other dolls you're in storage with. Depending on how long you're in storage for you might even go into hibernation. Dolls sometimes do that, especially if they're alone or in an enclosed space or both. Our minds can't cope with the isolation and the claustrophobia forever, so we kind of shut down for a while until we're found and loved again.
But anyway, Picture Pockets Kira was in the same crate as me, and she was really curious what it'd been like to be part of a photo shoot. So one day she asked me about it. It'd been an indoor photo shoot and nothing really exciting had happened, so there really wasn't much to talk about. At least that's what I thought. But Picture Pockets Kira listened to every word like it was the most interesting story she'd ever heard. She didn't interrupt, but she asked a bunch of questions after I'd stopped talking. After I'd gone over every detail of the photo shoot, Picture Pockets Kira said something about her own interest in photography.
From there the conversation just took off. Time seemed to fly by, instead of crawling at a snail's pace. That one shared interest helped us open up to each other, and as the days passed we talked about a lot more than just photography. We became friends, then best friends, and as more time passed we realized we were in love.
Now the one thing we were really worried about was Treesa. Like most doll collectors, Treesa's a bit of a matchmaker at heart. When she was a little kid, she did what little kids do and paired off her dolls however she wanted. Her current technique is still less than subtle. She has a bad habit of introducing two dolls to each other, and then leaving them somewhere they'll be forced to spend time together.
But anyway, we weren't sure if Treesa already had plans for one or both of us. I even wondered if she'd planned to pair me up with Jean after the photo shoot.
Well, eventually the day came when Treesa decided to sort through the crate we were in. She started unpacking the crate, lining us dolls up on the bed. Picture Pockets Kira was next to me on the bed and I glanced over at her out of the corner of my eye. I thought how much easier it would be if we could just tell Treesa how we felt. But that was impossible. As far as we knew, Treesa still wasn't in on the secret that dolls were alive. So we just lay there with our hands touching and waited to see what would happen next.
Now Treesa isn't always the most observant person, so I have no idea how she figured it out. Maybe she noticed our hands touching or how close we were to each other. Or maybe she sensed it somehow, woman's intuition or something like that. Or it could've just been dumb luck. Treesa had, without realizing it, dressed us in outfits with very similar color schemes. However it happened, something tipped her off.
She had just finished unpacking the crate and was looking over all the dolls lined up on the bed when her eyes focused on me and my girlfriend. For a little while Treesa just stared at us with a sort of blank look on her face. Then she smiled. "You make a cute couple," she said. She picked us both up and asked, "bonded over your shared interest in photography?" That's when I knew things would be ok. We didn't have to worry about being split up. Somehow, Treesa understood how we felt.
Treesa turned to Picture Pockets Kira and said, "I guess you'll need a name now". I couldn't have been happier. Picture Pockets Kira is a bit of a mouthful, and there are so many Kira dolls in the world. My Kira was special, and she deserved a special name.
Treesa was partial to 'Nikon' for a while, until she realized she didn't know how to pronounce it. Is the 'i' supposed to be pronounced as 'ih', 'eye', or 'ee'? Treesa settled on Nokia, a brand of camera phone, to fit the photography/picture theme. My guess is Treesa doesn't know the names of any famous photographers. Nokia herself isn't bothered by her new name, so even though it's a little more special than I had in mind I can live with it.
I think what I love most about Nokia is how she can turn the most boring, everyday things into something special and exciting. Every day with Nokia is an adventure, even if we decide to spend the day doing nothing at all. She told me the secret of life once. At least, she told me what I think is the secret of life. She said that life is the journey, not the destination. And I can't think of another doll I'd rather share this journey with than Nokia.
Jimmy and Nokia
Well, as they say in the movie business, that's a wrap.
Stay Focused, Jimmy
