"God Bless You, Mr. Potato Head"
Mr. Potato Head, your bright colors and creative worlds made my dysfunctional childhood just a bit less dysfunctional. You were my friend, my entertainer, and my source of comfort. To me, Mr. Potato Head was the “everyman.” He was the well-meaning struggling man, trying to make a good life for himself and Mrs. Potato Head. I imagined his situations to be funny. He was likable, but naïve and got into all kinds of scrapes. At least that was my interpretation of Mr. Potato Head. I’m also old enough to remember when Mr. Potato Head had a lot of friends: Oscar Orange, Katie Carrot, Pete the Pepper, Kooky Cucumber, etc. It set the stage for numerous made-up drawings and comic books.
Then in the early 70s, Mr. Potato Head went through some changes. He got larger, there were fewer parts and there were no more friends, just him. While I still loved my smaller Mr. Potato Head community sets, this new guy was fascinating. He was my own personal buddy. With limited parts, less was more and the challenge of working within the limits was awesome. He was my friend, my pal, and a source of comfort in a very unpleasant childhood. Naturally, Mr. Potato Head couldn’t protect me from the actual horrors of life as a child, but he sure did give me a good distraction and something else to think about.
Years went by. I outgrew Mr. Potato Head because, of course, that’s what I was expected to do. I bought no more and the ones I had were either sold at family garage sales, given away, or simply discarded. I didn’t see him for years. Kind of like when you drift away from a friend, but after a while, start to wonder about what ever happened to them. As far as I knew, Mr. Potato Head still looked the same as he did the last day I played with him. Then, in the early 80s, I saw Mr. Potato Head in a store. He looked very different from how I remembered him and nothing like the ones from my childhood. With this latest upgrade, I barely recognized him at all. I took it as just another sign that Mr. Potato Head was well in my past and would never be a part of my life again. But then, the movie, Toy Story came out; while Mr. Potato Head wasn’t a major character in it, he had quite a presence in the movie that couldn’t be ignored. Likewise, Mr. Potato Head’s personality in the movie wasn’t anything like I had envisioned for him, but he was still there and was significant enough to bring back all kinds of old feelings. Suddenly, I had this strange sense of longing for the happiness Mr. Potato Head had brought me in the past. I wanted the old versions from my childhood back, but they were nowhere to be found. Mind you, this was before the Internet had a prominent role in everyone’s life. I had no computer and knew nothing about online resources, so all I could do was go to garage sales, flea markets, and thrift stores, hoping a vintage Mr. Potato Head would show up, but it never did. Then, I decided that any Mr. or Mrs. Potato Head was better than none at all. I went to my local department store and bought the current versions of Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head. Of course, I was too old for any of this, but I justified my interest by officially declaring myself to be a “Toy Collector.” This idea led to further inspiration. I bought a toy collectors’ magazine and put an ad in the classified that said, “Potato Head Hunter, looking for Mr. Potato Heads that were made before 1983.” Before I knew it, my home was filled with numerous vintage Mr. Potato Heads, the same kinds I had in childhood. Could it actually be that I could recreate my childhood as an adult? In a word, NO. No, of course not. You only get to be a child once, for better or for worse. But, could I create a memorial to the few happy moments of my childhood that stood out? YES! Yes, I could and did! The whole idea grew and grew. My collection of Mr. Potato Heads got larger and inspired me to collect additional toys from my childhood as well. The areas of comfort in an unhappy childhood were remembered and would now be a source of comfort in the cruel adult world also. A great escape.
So, God bless you, Mr. Potato Head. Thank you for being my friend, for the laughs, the entertainment, and being a filter for my tears. Yes, I know you’re not real, that you’re just a plastic toy, but at the end of the day, that just means that you couldn’t hurt me like so many others have. God bless you, Mr. Potato Head. I’ve loved you in childhood, I’ve loved you in adulthood, and I’ll love you until the day I die.
By G.B.