"Well, Mandy," Pippa said, "when are you leaving to go up to Portland for the Yarn Crawl?"
Pippa knew the Yarn Crawl was an event where human people who knit get to go from one yarn shop to the next, getting ideas of what to knit, finding what they want to buy and having a good time. The Writer always took Mandy along, because Mandy likes to knit. She noticed then that Mandy looked a little disappointed.
"We're not going," Mandy told her. "I’ve just been trying to get up the energy to take everything back upstairs."
"Are you giving it up for lent?" Pippa asked.
"No," Mandy replied. "It’s the weather. It isn’t safe." Mandy motioned to the window.
Pippa went and looked out.
This is what she saw.
She turned and said, "We’ve had this much snow before."
"Yes," Mandy agreed, "but there are mountains between here and Portland, where the Yarn Crawl is happening, and they’re getting much more snow than here, and the whole area where the city is is getting lots of snow. It’s dangerous, even if we get to the city safely. Some places traffic is just stopped. People have been getting out and walking."
"It's OK, though" Mandy said, when she saw that Pippa looked concerned. "The Writer and I will be able to do it online. It isn't the same, but sometimes we have to change our plans because of weather," she pointed out, "like when Veronika's cruise was canceled because of the hurricane. She found out when she was packing to go. She was very disappointed, but she knew she had to stay safe."
"To cheer her up, we held a disappointment party," Mandy added. "It was different from what Veronika had planned, but it was fun, and she got to wear the dress I knitted for her to wear for dinner at the Captain's table. She put it on, and everyone complimented her on how she looked and told me what I great job I did. We pretended we were all sitting with her at the Captain's table."
"Well," Pippa suggested, "maybe you can give the Yarn Crawl up for Lent, then." She thought that would be an efficient use of a disappointment.
Mandy laughed. "Giving something up for Lent has to be a choice, not something that’s forced on you."
Then she had a thought. "Are you giving up something for Lent?" she asked.
"I’ve been trying to decide," Pippa responded.
"I know you and Jolena give up pretending to eat chocolate for Lent," she said, "and I thought about that, but I don’t really like to pretend to eat chocolate, so it isn’t really giving it up if you don’t care about it anyway, is it?"
Mandy agreed that Pippa had a point.
"Then I thought about giving up playing with Pauly for Lent," Pippa continued. "Playing with Pauly is something I like to do."
"But that would mean he would have to give up playing with me," Pippa pointed out, "and I didn’t think that was fair, because he doesn’t have any other dolls to play with at his house, and it would be awkward if he came to play with Emil and Billy, and I just ignored him. Then I thought about giving up my bear for Lent," Pippa went on, "but who would play with him? He might think I don’t love him anymore."
"No," Mandy said, shaking her head, "we don’t want what we give up to hurt someone else."
"Then," Pippa said, "I thought I might give up reading another chapter in Alice in Wonderland, but I thought that might be too hard to keep up."
Hardly a day went by that Pippa didn’t read a chapter from her favorite book.
"It should be a sacrifice," Mandy said, "but not something you know you can’t complete."
"That brings me to my next idea," the smaller doll said. "I thought about giving up wearing my new snowsuit for Lent.
"But then it finally snowed." She tried very hard to roll her eyes while she pointed to the window where the snow was falling again, but she couldn’t roll her eyes, so she rolled her head instead.
"So then," Pippa concluded, "I thought about how Mariah doesn’t pretend to eat or drink anything all the time it's daylight during Ramadan."
"She helps with the cooking, but she doesn't eat or drink anything," Pippa said.
"She gets up when it's still dark to pretend to eat breakfast, then she pretends to eat a big meal at night, after it gets dark," Pippa explained, even though she knew Mandy was aware of how Mariah celebrated Ramadan.
"She lets me help get food together to give to real people who don’t have any food," Pippa remembered. "They have to eat for real, not just pretend! She says one reason not to eat or drink during Ramadan is so we can understand what it's like for people who have to go hungry because they have no food."
"Mariah is the only one who celebrates Ramadan in our family," Pippa told Mandy, "so I think I’ll celebrate with her this year. I'll give up pretending to eat all the time she does. That way, she won't be alone."
"That’s a great idea," Mandy agreed. "I think I will, too! This year Ramadan starts during Lent. It will be good to celebrate together!"
"So we’re giving up Lent for Lent," Pippa suggested.
"No," Mandy told her, "giving up something is only part of Lent, just like fasting (or not eating or drinking) during the daytime is only part of Ramadan, but I think I’ll still give up pretending to eat chocolate. I can pretend it will be good for my figure," she said."
The two dolls thought about their little vinyl bodies.
Then they looked at each other and laughed.
Veronika: Götz Classic Kidz Vroni
Mandy: Götz Happy Kidz Katie 2015
Jolena: Götz Happy Kidz Lena in Aspen
Charlotte: Götz Happy Kidz Anna in Paris
Mariah: Götz Happy Kidz Mariah, "Chosen" from My Doll Best Friend
Billy: Götz Happy Kidz Lily at London
Emil: Götz Happy Kidz Emilia
"The Doll's Storybook" is not affiliated with Gotz Dolls USA Inc. or Götz Puppenmanufaktur International GmbH.
Watch for the next story each Friday afternoon at 1:00 PM Pacific Time.
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Copyright © 2023, 2024 by Peggy Stuart
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