My friend Cathy and I like to carve out rooms for our troll dolls – or Wishniks as they were called in the 1960s – in rotten tree stumps in the woods. They were like natural dollhouses for these dolls whose hair was an unnatural color.

Cathy’s arms were deformed. They were short and curved inward – and she only had 4 tiny fingers on each. I don’t know why they were like that. Her mom was of that age when thalidomide was given to pregnant women, but I don’t know if she took it.

Anyway, those little arms didn’t stop Cathy from making troll chambers by poking a stick in the soft, rotten wood.

We were two girls playing in the dappled light of a forest.