I Get a Giggle Out of Life

I Get a Giggle Out of Life

I've often heard it said that art in its truest form is an expression of feelings. This poem was written because of feelings that were captured and expressed in the creation of a doll by a dear friend of ours. Christine McCoy makes the most wonderful dolls. Now for the most part dolls in the past have not evoked any particular feelings for me. As a child I had a couple of dolls but they were playmates and friends. I still have one of them and it reminds me of feelings of when I was a child. But generally dolls have been cute, cuddly and inanimate.

That was before I saw the creations of a truly talented artist. It is hard for me to look at any of her creations without having them evoke some kind of a response.

A few months ago Analia and I were visiting Christine at her home and were delighted to see that she had created a new doll. This doll was a plump lady swinging on a swing and eating from a box of chocolates balanced on her lap. She had daisies between her toes that she seemed to have plucked up from below while swinging. She had the most wonderful smile on her face and seemed to be giggling; in fact between her chocolates and her giggling, her mouth seemed to have about all it could handle. Her dress was flying in the breeze and it was pretty obvious that here was a lady that knew how to enjoy life.

I fell in love with the doll immediately. I really wanted to be right there with her to enjoy the moment. So many feelings welled up inside me that I told Christine that I really felt that there was a poem there waiting to be expressed. Time passed and I thought about the doll from time to time but I couldn't quite capture the feelings that I had while I was looking at it. Then last weekend we stopped by her place on our way out of town to see yet another of her creations. While we were there I asked where the lady on the swing was. She got it out and the feelings all came back. This poem is my attempt at a verbal expression of the poem that Christine wrote with her wonderful doll.

Gale L. Wolfenbarger

17 June 1992

I Get a Giggle Out of Life

There's a tickle in my tummy

And it's creeping up my spine.

It started with a chocolate

From a box that's only mine.

But now I've started swinging

And my toes caress the breeze.

I think I'll sing myself a song

Or do anything I please.

The fragrance of spring's lovely flowers

Is tickling my nose,

Like daisies in a sun bathed field

That slip between my toes.

The sun is bright and warms my knees

As I go up and down.

The wind is playing with my curls,

I rather look a clown.

Up I go so very high

'Till toes are all I see

And down again in giddy flight,

The earth comes up to me.

Tomorrow I may find the time

To ponder cares and woes.

Today I'll have another bite

And enjoy the life I've chose.

Gale L. Wolfenbarger

14 June 1992