Weird thoughts spring to mind when I’m in the middle of practicing yoga. What makes them weird is how random and benign they are. There’s no common thread between them. They’re special in no way—boring, even. For example, these thoughts include the following:
- The Chicken Strips Melt sandwich at Perkin’s
- The dried mushroom section of Bales, an upscale grocery store formerly located in Beaverton, Oregon
- A Portland antique store named Stars, which was divided into two parts by SE Milwaukie Ave
- The annoying couple from LOST who were buried alive in the sand (maybe this one is not so benign)
Clearly, these aren’t the most important moments of my life—or are they?! Nah, they aren’t.
Another thing I remembered during yoga is the time I pretended I was Minnie Mouse. Some context: I collected trading cards when I was young, favoring the more, shall we say, feminine cards—ones that featured Barbie, Ariel (the dopest of little mermaids), the cast of Beverly Hills 90210, and female superheroes. More specifically, I cared not only about the cards intended for ladies of varying ages, but ones that featured women. Cards with guys were all the same—so faceless, so dull. I couldn’t project a dream life on them!
Speaking of projecting a dream life: I also collected Disney’s Minnie ‘n Me trading cards, which featured art so cute, my younger self just had to do something special with all the card doubles. And that something special was a scrapbook from Minnie Mouse’s perspective! Although “scrapbook” may be too generous a term for gluing cards in a pink Mead notebook and writing captions underneath them. Why, how about you see for yourself? Because I saved it. Of course I did.
The First Minnie Mouse Scrapbook
Here we have the title page, on which “Minnie” has scrawled an uncharacteristically defensive message. It’s like she anticipated the viewer believing that she did not, in fact, work hard on this, but rather that she just scribbled blurbs beneath some cardstock photos pasted on some far-from-archival lined paper. Which is like, not true!
This prickly preamble directly precedes her brief and chipper invitation for the viewer to peruse her life in snapshots. Note the drastic change in tone. What’s up, Minnie? Are you disassociating?
Also, let us take a moment to wonder about the intended audience for this scrapbook. Whoever it is, Minnie expects them to judge her content. Do they not know Minnie well? Or do they know her too well? Is someone forcing her to scrapbook? Is that the reason behind the curt, mildly hostile introduction? Hmm.
And now for some colorful scenes from Minnie’s life, showcasing her fun and failures. There’s a missed opportunity here to elaborate on what’s happening in each picture rather than just (presumably) summarizing the info on the back of each card. But when was this, 1992, 1993? I was eight or nine and obviously very, very busy. There was no time for that.
Comments on each of the above images, moving in a zig zag from the top left to the top right, to the middle left and so on:
- If you happen to say “Friends Forever” instead of “Friends Forevers,” are you denied entry into the clubhouse?
- It doesn’t look like you think Fifi is being a pain. You’re enjoying yourself, Minnie, just admit it!
- Actually, yes.
- “Hit it off”—you two are clearly going steady.
- What is that red thing on the floor? A heart pillow? A meaty steak?
- And then no one ever heard from “Milly” again.
What can I really say about these pages? They’re really to the point. I do love the bright color palette. No wonder young me liked these cards (aside from the obvious Minnie Mouse inclusion): They’re attractive and cute and show Minnie and Co. having a ridiculous amount of fun.
If I were to do something similar to this scrapbook thing today, I would avoid pasting the cards in at random (which appears to be what has happened here despite Minnie Mouse’s insistence that she worked hard). Instead, I’d arrange all the cards in a way that tells a story, connecting the events from one card to the next.
Try as I might, though, I currently cannot connect the dots between the cards on this page. I devoted a significant amount of thought to this, yet I can’t elegantly explain the path from Halloween night to the campsite to the illegal lemonade stand and so on. If you can, that is sincerely impressive. Gold star!
Another option would be to make the blurbs match what’s in the picture, but take it in a less obvious direction. Examples: “Our first XXX film was very educational! Who knew you could bend that way?” or “Here I am, murdering flowers for the sick, sadistic thrill of it!” or “Look at us, just moments before we all fell through the ice and nearly drowned! I think I saw God that day!” You get the idea.
This introduction to the cast of characters unhelpfully shows up at the end, i.e., after everyone’s already introduced. LOL @ the question mark underneath the cat, one of her so-called best friends. Yeah, clearly Minnie Mouse and What’s Her Meow are real blood sisters!
The title page mentioned a part two to this scrapbook series. Is there a part two, you may wonder? THERE IS! And we will explore that next time.
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