TA – DA!

That was the name of my imaginary friend.  And she was a legend in her time.

EVERYONE talked about Tada, my friends and family and sometimes even strangers asked me if she existed.  They just wanted to see what I would say so they could laugh at me I guess.

I never really ever had an imaginary friend like some do, but her existence began at a very young age as a defense against my mother’s sarcastic wit.  I was forever trying to perform and my acts were always accompanied by me yelling “Ta-da,” very dramatically.  One day my mother quips up “Tada, who’s Tada?”  To which I answered “she’s my friend.”  Then I had to describe her as I threw out answers off the top of my three-year-old head in response to my mother who was barraging me with questions, thinking she was funny.  I remember being angry with her sarcasm so I kept it up as long as she did.  A trait I had to continue to this very day in my relationship with her.

Later on my younger sister would ask me about Tada and I would tell all kinds of funny or strange stories to keep her amused and laughing.  She would tell others about it, our friends or kids she knew in school, but I didn’t.  Those were the strangers who asked about Tada that I mentioned earlier.

The death of Tada kind of suits this Halloween time some celebrate.

When I was about 11 I told everyone that Tada had sadly passed away and I was to have a funeral for her that afternoon in the local cemetery. Yeah, you heard right.  I was so sick of people asking me about her I finally had to kill her!  I took an old doll of mine that was really messed up anyway, and wrapped it in a shroud and went with my sister and some friends to that cemetery where I proceeded to desecrate the hallowed grounds by holding a mock funeral for dear little plastic Tada, whose existence served me well for about 8 years of my life.  I did it in the back some place and actually buried the doll and left it.

I sometimes imagine someone finding the body of Tada and thinking “WTF” as the kids say now.