Inspired Imagination

This was an entry I wrote for Sparkler Monthly http://sparklermonthly.tumblr.com/  for a contest they had about how people share their worlds. I didn't win, but I'm still very proud of this slice of my childhood.


It began with Sailor Moon. Two girls, eight and nine, bonded during recess as Sailor Mars and Sailor Jupiter fought against the Negaverse. Battling imaginary monsters, Salina and I would save the world day after day as our two favorite scouts. Then, with a set of seven Sailor Moon Adventure Dolls, our games expanded in bigger, better ways. No longer limited to our bodies, the scouts went on madcap adventures that sent them bungee jumping off the second floor stairs, tumbling over rocks, and desperately running along the wheel of a bicycle, trying to stay alive. The dolls made our games more exciting, but the rough escapades took a heavy toll on the toys, putting us in a bind. How to continue our daring adventures when our beloved heroes were breaking?

The answer was Barbie. Far easier to replace, we decided to transform our Barbie dolls into Sailor Scouts. Our games began again with exciting new life. No character from Sailor Moon was off limits. But, we didn’t stop there. Using Barbies opened us up to a world of characters just waiting to be discovered. Our imaginations had no limitations. We began to build a world beyond Sailor Moon, creating original characters and picking characters from our favorite shows, movies, and anime. Soon, our creation took on a life of its own.

Minor characters in one world became the heroes of their own stories, finding friends, and forging new lives for themselves in our world. Characters from completely different stories never meant to meet, crossed paths in our town becoming so entwined it’s impossible for one to exist without the other. As the years passed, our world expanded from a dollhouse with seven characters to a town of forty-seven, each with unique lives and personalities.

Now at twenty-five and twenty-six we live on different sides of the country and no longer get together every weekend to play dolls. Despite the distance and responsibilities that come with age, the town we created seventeen years ago still exists. It lives on, beyond the dolls, in illustrations, short stories, comics, radio plays, and continues to grow with us. The world two kids created from their inspired imaginations now kindles the dreams of a younger generation.

When my cousins ask for bedtime stories I tell them about the adventures of our beloved characters and their little town. It’s a place where friendships are made, hearts are broken, villains seek redemption, and the weak find strength. I tell them of heroes triumphing over evil, sometimes at a heavy cost, and the enduring power of hope. Looking into their enraptured faces, imaginations beginning to blaze, I know by sharing those stories our world got bigger and a new one was born.