Mattel, Plastics, and Postalitas

Sometimes I think I'm the only person that rejects extreme materialism and what my friends and I used to call "the plasticos" when I was in high school. Note: I like to have a nice car, a big house, and fine clothes, and I like to go out to dinner. I said extreme materialism.

Anyway, although it's easy enough to accuse some sets of people in Miami as plasticos, the truth is, that the phenomenon transcends culture. Up here in the Deep South we have plasticos, too. Only, we call them Ken and Barbie, after the obvious reference to the plastic toys most little girls played with a hundred years before those nasty Bratz things became popular, but that's another rant.

Here, I'm surrounded by this brand of Ken and Barbie, but that doesn't keep me from having to play nice.

I remember when I was a kid in the 60's that I received one of the new Ken dolls as a gift. He had plastic hair that was painted a weird light brown, and of course, blue eyes. Ken came with a very mod outfit, and an orange bathing suit, with towel and sandals accessories.

I peeked inside the suit, you know. Everybody did. My dad did, too. One of us was relieved to find out that Ken was not anatomically correct. Guess which one? In retrospect, what would a six year old do with that kind of information? Mattel was prudent and wise to emasculate Ken.

Unfortunately, that has since become my arbiter of reality. I measure folks' level of materialism and disconnect from real life values by how they respond to my personal brand of trailer-park-chic. My friend says I wear comfortable shoes and have natural hair. I think that's code for maybe you should comb your hair and dress up a bit. No offense taken; I am, after all, comfortable. Nevertheless, every once in a while, I run across a distorted sense of my own reality, and see Ken and Barbie all around me.

Help!