How Tommy Tippy Blew My Mind

Hello Readers, I hope today finds you well. Due to my political burnout which I addressed in my last post I am going to spending more time recounting my Hippie Childhood Memoirs. I hope you enjoy them, and if not well. turn on , tune on and drop out....Peace.

How Tommy Tippee Blew My Mind

Most baby boomers will remember Tommy Tippee cups. They were a brand of training cup that were weighted on the bottom to avoid spillage, by tipping, and they came with a lid with a sippy spout. At age 2 or 3 I no longer needed a training cup but even as a child I was sentimental about favorite things and had a difficult time letting go. I continued to use my Tommy Tippee cup without the lid, for at least a year or two after becoming adept at drinking out of a regular cup (or as adept as I ever would be)

Tommy Tippee cups featured a picture of their name sake on the side of the cup. As long as you were right handed, as were all ‘normal’ children of the 1950’s and 60’s, the picture faced you as you lifted your cup to drink. The picture was of Tommy himself, a cute little bear, proficiently sipping with a self-satisfied smile on his face. Chin raised, eyes narrowed he seemed to beam proudly as if to say ‘good job with the big girl/boy cup!’ reinforcing our recovery from nipple dependency.

One day as I was sitting at the table drinking from my cup I stared at the smiling face of T.T. and realized that the cup he was holding was the same as mine. This meant his cup also had the same milk sipping Tommy Tippee picture. And in that picture was yet another picture and in that picture another and on and on…Tommy Tippees forever.

I called my Mom into the room to share my discovery.

 "Mom” I asked, “how many of them are there?”

"Well there’s one cup and one picture”

“But no there’s a picture in the picture and a picture in that picture and how many more?”

“Well it’s probably infinite” my Mom replied casually

“What’s infinite?”

“It means there’s no end, it goes on forever, you know like space”. She said this as if it was something I already understood and for a moment I was wondering if I’d missed something somewhere.

“What do you mean? The stars have to end somewhere?” For some reason I imagined a large wall somewhere in space.

My Mother, being a clever teacher, replied with another question, “But what would come after that?”

“I dunno, more space?” I was reaching here, hoping for the right answer, for as good a teacher as she was I was prepared to match her skills by being a good student. Secretly in my imagination I pictured something like the Wizard of Oz dwelling behind that great space curtain.

“Exactly! More space on and on forever”

I would have preferred the Wizard of Oz answer. I began to cry. “But it can’t just go on forever there’s got to be something else”

“We really don’t know Jenny, that’s all we know” I could see my Mother starting to become slightly impatient. She had been baking bread in the other room and now seconds later she was trying to explain an uncomprehendable concept to a child who was barely into the concrete operations phase of development.

I don’t remember where the conversation went after that, I seem to recall helping my mom bake bread which meant I got to pull off a small piece of dough, mold it into whatever shape I chose and bake it in the oven. Baking bread is a great grounding method when one’s mind begins to spiral into the realm of fear and panic.

Regardless of whether that was indeed the outcome or if I was simply told to finish eating lunch and do whatever it was I did in those days, I do know that in the following weeks and months I spent many a night lying awake in bed staring out my window at the stars overhead wondering how far infinity is. And why no one seemed to have a reasonable answer.

© 2013, Jennifer Hazard

Flower Child at work

Hey Everyone!
It's been quite some time since I've posted here. I've been quite busy with two other blogs and a Facebook group. I've also been quite involved   in political actions, networking, teaching and learning about the actions we citizens can take to confront Corporate/Political attempts to usurp out democracy and freedom. As I become increasingly involved, informed and passionate I frequently reflect on my wild, gypsy childhood and how it prepared me for an adulthood of passionate activism, critical thinking, problem solving and compassion. I'm working on a story, a 60's flower Child Adventure and promise to publish soon. In the meantime here are some pictures of me and brother enjoying free childhood and exploration. The cabin was my Paternal Grandparents, located in the Upper peninsula of Michigan, home to many childhood adventures spent living close to the Earth and learning her rhythms.

The Battle for Barbie

Barbie, Americas iconic supermodel, working woman and veterinarian was born in February 1959, same as me. Unlike me however, Barbie had sprung to life fully formed, blonde and perfect like a plastic Venus. By the mid 1960's Barbie was enjoying the spotlight as a high fashion modern woman with an ever expanding wardrobe of clothes and accessories. Naturally like all girls my age I wanted a piece of the action. My Mother on the other hand, wanted nothing to do with Barbie, her friends or the company that produced them. No matter how much I whined and asked ‘but why?’ she wouldn't give in. "Their shoes fall off and get lost". “Their heads pop off". "They have unrealistic bodies". Christmas was the worst; we were bombarded by advertising depicting happy, well dressed girls bonding in the Barbie sisterhood. Winter was boring; I never was much for playing in snow even as a child.
Like most obsessions, my designs on Barbie gradually simmered and as summer rolled in games of "ghost in the graveyard", kickball and riding bikes perilously through the neighbors’ yards kept me pretty well occupied.
One day, my best friend and I were wandering around the block looking for something to do and we came across a rummage sale, tables of cheesy colorful treasures and oddities and...Barbie. There she was lying stiffly on her back, her ridiculously pointed feet sans shoes, her breasts like holy pyramids piercing the summer sky. She had a red sheath cocktail dress, something satiny. The dresses had real zippers in those days, which generally snagged on the stitching. But nothing could deter me. She was available for the low cost of one quarter, which I just happened to have from allowance.
I remember strutting into the kitchen Barbie in hand, the flimsy screen door slamming behind me in a Declaration of my Independence.


My mother looked baffled “where did you get that?” she wasn’t angry, just puzzled


I explained that I had taken matters into my own hands and since I had spent my own money I felt it was only fair that I should be able to keep her. There was no way this woman, raised with a Yankee work ethic could disagree “Well I suppose so,” she sighed “but don’t be surprised when her head pops off”.


The next few days were spent indulging Barbie in bubble baths, hair styles and my attempts to create some sort of alternate wardrobe out of fabric scraps, ribbon and various other household items, including electricians tape. Pretty soon it was becoming evident that without her entourage, multiple accessories and costume changes, Barbie was like many other Socialites, just another girl with lots of clothes and big boobs. I began to crave the accoutrements, the plastic coat hangers, the costume changes, the tiny shoes. Barbie is like cocaine, a little bit leads to more...and more. Like many addicts, I turned to crime to feed my craving. I stole a brush set from a girl down the street, rationalizing, as all good criminals do, that she had more money and more toys and therefore it wouldn’t be missed. The set was white, swirly plastic no doubt intended to resemble mother of pearl. It came with a little hand mirror, which I tried in vain to have Barbie hold in her hand gazing in appreciation as I styled her hair.


Maybe it was karma; after all I had stolen the brush set. Maybe it was simply a case of mother is always right which really just another form of karma; but as I was combing her fossilized perm I hit a snag. Then it happened. I gazed in horror at the comb with Barbies head dangling by a few stubborn hairs. In my other hand her body, still awkwardly holding the mirror, reflecting back the mayhem that had just befallen the teen queen.


Shit. I prayed silently that my mother wouldn’t make a surprise visit to my room as I desperately twisted, pushed and cajoled her head back on the stub of her neck. First I pushed too hard, leaving her lower jaw scrunched her face puffy and jowly. One I did get things positioned correctly; I discovered that true to my mother’s words, her head didn’t quite fit the same as before, it was a little looser and more wobbly.


My mother had enough kindness and discretion to not say “I told you so” and eventually the lure of Barbie faded in favor of Trolls or Creepy Crawlers.


Barbie was finally put to rest in the California street rain sewer, duct taped to her lover GI Joe in a rather unladylike manner.


She is survived by pink haired troll and several rubbery centipedes.



© 2011 Jennifer Hazard

The Wild Child

I recently received some pictures from my former stepmother from the summer of 1970. It was a summer we spent  living in an abandoned farmhouse in Central Wisconsin.
There were 8 of us kids, my brother and me, my stepmothers 5 kids and my baby sister, the product of the dad and stepmothers short lived marriage.
 The land and the house belonged to my stepmothers parents, I have no idea how long the place had been abandoned, but it had no indoor plumbing, the water came from a pump down by the barn, some 50 yards from the house. There was very little in the house save a classic 19th century wood burning stove. The stove worked, and my stepmother frequently cooked on it. We had also dug a cooking pit using our collapsible army shovels. My Dad taught us how to prepare the coals where we cooked kettles of stew in a Dutch oven underground.
 Living in such an environment with acres of playground in the form of woods, a pond, corn fields and an old barn we wandered, climbed, swam, explored, rode horses from down the road, and learned about things such as leeches, ticks and sharing a bedroom with skittish little mice.
I remember all of us kids bathing in the lake, it was that or under the icy cold well water from the hand pump. I remember all 8 of us sleeping on the floor in sleeping bags in the upstairs which was basically one large empty room, with mice.
When I look back now 40 years later with the training of a Social Worker, I realize today's bureaucracy would have had a field day with that scenario.  I can imagine the initial assessment report...and it makes me laugh. I don't recall feeling neglected, or unhappy or maltreated. I recall one of the last years of pure childhood before puberty hit. I recall learning about nature and her ways by spending hours in the woods or at the lake. And best of all I remember riding a tall Appaloosa named Beau, galloping at top speed with the wind stinging my eyes, my tangled hair flying, feeling wild, brave, adventurous and unstoppable.
There's something to be said for letting kids be kids.
Copyright 2010, Jennifer Hazard