Don't Under Estimate The Influence Of A Plush Toy

YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE A SENTIMENTAL SIDE, TO BE IN THE ANTIQUE PROFESSION

IT DOESN'T MAKE FOR GOOD BUSINESS, NECESSARILY, BUT IT KEEPS YOUR HEART IN THE RIGHT MOOD; WRITING, AH THAT'S JUST NUTS!

     I wouldn't have any adverse reaction whatsoever, finding myself suddenly in a room stuffed, to overflowing, with kids' toys; with game boards tacked to the walls, Hot Wheels cars and trucks scattered here and there, Lego structures at various levels of construction, and comic books covering over the leftover floor space. I like being rejuvenated, and toys do this for me. Every writer, artist, musician looks for a deep well of inspiration. Toys by reason of association, for me, have always been a curious remedy for periods of lesser enthusiasm and general writing stalemates. I could sit in the midst of a toy room, with a cheek to cheek smile etched on my face, all day long, and succumb to hunger long before boredom.
     I have for a long time now, wanted to create a room in the house, (because the recreation room is full of antiques) that would be decorated with some of Andrew, and Robert's old toys, so that I could retreat there to re-connect, with what I consider, was one of the most fascinating periods of my adult life. As a Mr. Mom for most of their childhood, and on through teenage years, I was devoted to their interests, which leapt like a lightning flash, from their preoccupation with Hot Wheels, Lego and hockey cards, onward and upward to guitars, drums, and honking big amplifiers, in what only seemed a couple of days of play-limbo. That's life, right? Don't blink, or you'll miss it. Here's the thing, though! From the beginning of the Mr. Mom gig, I wrote intensively during the work part of the days, to keep my job in the local media, in and around looking after them. On weekends we were antique hunters, and Suzanne tag-teamed the lads with me, as we toured around the region looking for treasure. I actually found over time, that I couldn't write without being in charge of the boys. They were my muses. I needed them playing around my feet, with their toys, to give me that sense of recreational pleasure, in order to write my feature columns for Muskoka Publications, specifically The Muskoka Sun, of which I was feature editor. I needed the din of play to inspire me. I knew this, the day they were both in school, and the fountain suddenly, and alarmingly, dried up.
      It took me years to find other ways to motivate myself, to what sprang forth so liberally in the days of their childhood. I have never really returned to the productivity of those days, when I'd write all winter long, in order to fill a May 24 to Thanksgiving season of Muskoka Suns, which at that time, could hit a hundred pages on holiday weekends. I've never told the boys that they inspired me, because I wouldn't want to them to get cocky, and use it against me, in the case of getting an unfair edge in an argument. Yet, it is dishonest of me,  and I know this too well, to have never admitted, how much these perky little fellows, added to my zeal for creativity. Instead of them being an anchor, or in any way a burden to my career, that some parents might claim of their duty to provide guardianship, Andrew and Robert were the exact opposite. Seeing as I was the one who was best suited, in adaptable employment, to stay home during the week, giving up my editor's desk at The Herald-Gazette office, just up the street, it did seem at moments, I was making a career-ending compromise. Yet I had to admit, without any reservation, that Andrew and Robert, and of course my lovely bride, had provided me with a reserve of inspiration I could never have fully consumed without blissfully exploding. Forgive me then, if I retreat during anxious moments, frustrated by a lack of inspiration, and look upon these old toys that I remember with so much affection, to get me over the proverbial hump; just like it has today. In my early writing days, it would have been a bottle of rum or scotch; or the better part of a case of beer. A writer with a serious void of inspiration stars in their own haunting version of the movie "Lost Weekend," where liquid courage is consumed to excess and at great consequence to the subject author, Ray Miland; I didn't need any other source of inspiration, than our lads at play, and even when they were sleeping. it was good too. I found their gentle breathing as relaxing as the lapping of waves on a sandy beach.
     I told Suzanne shortly after we were engaged, that I would understand, if in the days leading up to our marriage, she suddenly got cold feet about marrying someone as eccentric as me. I made it clear to her, that it was one thing to marry a writer, but a much more complicated situation, to marry an antique dealer. Both professions necessarily involve periods of disassociation from normal day to day living. In antiques, we live in the past, and depend on death to give us the materials we need to proceed in our business ventures. We are as much gamblers, but instead of normal retail fare, we deal with the relics of history. Even Charles Dickens saw the strange fictions of antique dealers, in his story of "The Old Curiosity Shop," and in the character of second hand dealer, "Old Joe," in "A Christmas Carol," who is visited by the undertaker, and two house keepers, following the death of Ebeneezer Scrooge. They were selling his earthly possessions to Joe, including his watch, fob, cufflinks, bed curtains, and the very gown he might have been buried with, if the housekeeper hadn't stolen it in the days before. As I've written about many times, the antique profession has been characterized thousands of times, by some of the most revered writers to ever push a pen. I have been an antique dealer in one form, one location or another, for forty years. I am quite storied myself, thank you very much. I gamble on history all the time.
     As for writing, a colleague once referred to my penchant for long jags, at task, and then during long unproductive hiatus periods, as being "crazier than an outhouse rat." I didn't take it as a compliment, that's for sure, but today I understand what he meant. So I felt obliged to let Suzanne know, that living with the writer-kind, as well, as the antiquer, namely "Old Joe," was going to make her married life "storied" as well. I tried as well, to explain the ups and downs of the writer's mood, and even before we had dated a couple of months, she had experienced my bouts of minor depression, being uninspired, and then the peaks of exuberance, when I'd feel capable of writing a parallel of Tolstoy's "War and Peace," or Joseph Conrad's "Lord Jim." As I have been a journeyman writer for most of my professional life, also spanning forty years, I've had more stability with moods than most of my contemporary authors, who are constantly in quest of greater sources of inspiration. I learned how to write for a pay cheque, because that meant I could eat, drink and be the life of any party; I was the lamp shade-wearing fellow, who might also swing like Tarzan from the ceiling fan, having imbibed my fair share. As most antique dealers I've met in my life, and business pursuits, can be labelled mildly eccentric, every writer I've known, has been fully eccentric. If I start painting, as I have planned for semi-retirement, and begin wearing an askew tam, pulled down over my ears, I will be the perfect trio of "odd" and "unique." I have always known that my involvement in both professions, commanded a devotion that would occupy my mind constantly, because antique dealers never really sleep, and when they do, of course, they dream of great discoveries, and buried treasure. Writers are inherently strange buzzards who will rise in the middle of the night, to feed off some tiny morsel of inspiration, worrying that if they go back to sleep, it will evade them at first light.
     Suzanne has always accepted that I had other powerful obsessions, that competed for attention, and that by marrying me, she had to be liberal enough, to share her husband with others. We were talking about this last evening, because I felt it was incumbent of me, for all her long years of suffering with this reality, of divided loyalty, to at least thank her for staying with me, through this near-eternity of hit and miss relationship. Well, it was a lot more than "thank you," and I may have promised her that our final years together would be much less stressful than the first thirty or so. Seeing as I have no plans to quit either profession, and may start a latent art career, she just kept winking at me, about my assertion, that as a geezer, I would no longer be my usual oddball self at home and at work; I would be a revitalized pacifist, with the mood hiccups of a cricket, and the gentleness of a fat old cat. I should have footnoted this little tome, to declare that I make this proclamation about four times a year, when I sense that Suzanne is packing my bags for me, (which explains not having underwear in my drawer) in advance of pointing to the door, and announcing, "it's been fun, but get the hell out of here." She's pretty resilient to my eccentricities, God Bless her. I am changing my ways a wee bit, and you must have noticed the evolution of my blog, from being rigorously, scathingly political, and rip-roaringly critical, to being the passive, sentimental editorialist, as the hired-gun for Suzanne's newly launched facebook page, under the heading "Currie's Antiques." I even follow behind her now, when we shop for antiques and collectables, and I'm happy to push the grocery cart, as a silent partner, like I did for my mother a thousand years ago, at the Bracebridge A&P. I'm contented these days, to enjoy both professions, that at one point, ran me ragged, trying to stay on top. You never really get on top of either disciplines, but you don't figure this out until you've spent half your life trying. I have arrived, you might say, at the pinnacle of appreciation, that the only relationship worth my devotion now, is the marriage to my dear bride, who has lived with more ups and downs, than if she had worked for all these years as a yo-yo maker.
     I was telling her, you see, that my ongoing and ceaseless quest for inspiration, is much less frustrating these days, because I am finding both professions have taken on a gentler, calming command of my time; such that, for example, I can get stress relief, like the good old days of our family rearing, by just looking across from my favorite livingroom chair, each night, to see the scrunched-up, beady-eyed, frayed eared collection, of plush toys, that belonged to both boys, which are still stacked on the old wicker rocker, Robert used to sit on to watch television. Of all my eccentricities, Suzanne chose to live with, the one she found the oddest, and most pleasantly contradictory, was the fact I had undertaken, and succeeded, at being a "Mr. Mom," for both our sons, at the same time, as I was in the heavy-midst of antique hunting, and writing daily for the local press. From the time Andrew was three months old, I was left in charge, when Suzanne went back to her teach job at Bracebridge High School. I started looking after Robert through the weekdays, when he was almost a year of age. I held the post right through until the end of high school for both boys. Of all the perks of both the antique profession, and writing, there was nothing as fulfilling and amazing, as looking after the wee lads for those incredible years of childhood. It was the real mellowing of the old tyrant, as Suzanne calls me with considerable affection. So when I fixate on the plush toys, jammed into the rocker in front of me, it is with a most pleasant daydream that I think back to those amazing days, when inspiration flowed like an open tap, all day long, every day of the week and month. It didn't always feel like this, at times when I was changing two diapers, within minutes, stumbling and falling over scattered toys, stopping Robert from pulling the dog inside-out, or Andrew breaking eggs into the toaster, for a quickie omelette; and my own messing-up on food delivery services, to meet all their demands. I know now, that it was a very important developmental part, of not only their lives, buy my own. I can't help but get a little misty-eyed when I look over at these beat-up old plush toys, that got the lads through a lot of illnesses and upsets, and always seemed to wind-up on my lap in their company; often left for me to hold, (and I did with great affection) when Suzanne lifted one lad, or the other, off to bed after they'd gently fallen asleep. Suzanne would come back later for the stuffed hippo, Cowardly Lion, or teddy bear, so she could set it down beside them on the bed, so that they would be able to feel it, if they woke up after a bad dream, and needed the company of an old friend.
     I have lots of framed original art hung on the walls of our house, and hundreds of my favorite books within arm's reach, if I find myself in need of inspiration. Yet time and again, all the inspiration I need, is the mortal resource of recollection, when I look across and swear these stuffed toys are beckoning me to come and play. I guess it would sound rather silly, if I was to ever confess this during a writers' circle, in company of my peers; when they might instead, offer their sources of motivation, as being the literary milestones of James Joyce, Whittier, Emerson, Tennyson or Thoreau. Imagine the looks I might get, revealing that my source of inspiration for a particularly moving feature story, came from the smudged-up face of "Nomis" the Hippo, or "Mr. Greenjeans," the long-legged teddy bear? Actually, Suzanne thinks I would relish the opportunity, to brag about this love for family heirlooms, and fondness for reminiscences, with all its curious attributes for creative electricity. I would much rather have my recreation room full of old and known toys from my past, and my family's, that one full of antiques that belonged to someone else for long and long. I can't explain it, beyond this admission. But like the mother who couldn't tell her son he wasn't a chicken, because she needed the eggs, I would never want to over-analyze this situation for me, just in case I burst the bubble of my delusion, or not! If it works for me, well, that's all that counts.
      What inspires you?