Image courtesy Invaluable.com
Mork from Ork was my husband. You pulled his little cord with the white plastic ring on the end and he’d utter “Nanoo, Nanoo.” I designated him my husband when I was six. He was 18-inches in body length and sported a vividly-painted set of overalls and striped shirt—true to his Mork and Mindy appearance on T.V. He had his signature suspenders, Robin Williams face, and denim pants. All mine. My best guess is that my parents saw him in Toys R Us and knowing how much I enjoyed the sitcom on TV, bought it for me. The other guess is that I used my own birthday money from relatives and picked him off the shelf myself. I can’t recall exactly.
Technically speaking, a Robin Williams doll joined me everywhere I went. Sitting on the orange upholstered chair at a colleague of my dad’s house drinking a grape soda and talking about school with the adults was one situation I found myself in during the Mork doll years. His goofy presence beside me, and I’d cross his legs for effect. The feel of his cloth body against my hands. The sound of his Nanoo, Nanoo—both made me feel at ease in new situations. I think his stuffed head was designed much too big for his body—his floppy legs attached at this rectangular torso of a body. But again, he was all mine, and we were married. “Oh how cute your little girl is. Is that her doll?”
“He’s my husband. Mork. See.” Cord pulled. Nanoo, Nanoo. I was proud, and the sensation of his fabric gave me more comfort than I can explain.
I must remember to thank my parents for not judging me too hard and for letting me take him out of the car and into the homes of the people we were visiting. For those in the way bacl. Mork and Mindy--here’s the quick summary paraphrased from the fandom website called MorkandMindy.fandom.com:
Mork is a member of a race of humanoid life-forms, known as Orkans, from the planet Ork, sent to Earth to observe and report back on human behavior who is befriend by Mindy McConnell, an Earth Girl who helps shelter, guide, and teach him about the ways of Earthlings, and especially their emotions. Living with her in her apartment he forms a strong friendship with her, falling in love with her, proposing to and marrying her.
Mork’s character is highly endearing, and you want to be his friend from the moment you meet him. He’s kind, friendly, and very willing to learn the ways of human behavior. I adored the way Robin Williams developed the character, in turn, making us fall in love. Did I see a trait in Mork that I wanted in a friend, or was I simply mesmerized by the fantasy of a humanoid life-form being as emotional as real humans? Mork, a la Robin Williams, had hairy arms, a cake-sweet smile, and loud, blue eyes.
My Mork from Ork attachment makes me wonder why kids cling to objects, or why they’re drawn to characters from T.V. Why do we require that thing in our hands, our grip, near our noses to feel emotionally organized and at ease from setting to setting? Blankies, dolls, pillows pieces of fabric, whatever it may be that gives children (and sometimes adults), the feeling of comfort and home. Why do we run to their refuge in our beds or on our sofas and hold them tighter than life?
My youngest daughter carries her blanket around the house from the time she wakes up until she gets dressed, and then sleeps with it again at night. She does it more frequently when she’s feeling uncertain or uneasy about an upcoming event. During the first six months of Covid in 2020 when the whole world was quarantined, she had her blankie by her side always. There’s a ridge of the blanket that she prefers and rubs her thumbs over for comfort. She’s shown me the technique and then has asked me to try it. There’s comfort for her in the sensory experience of this soft fleece yard of blanket. The smell and the touch give her a feeling of security and familiarity. I had a plain white cotton piece of cloth when I was five years old, and I’d bring it on trips to Bradlees and Best, and I suppose it’s comparable to my little one’s “blankie.”
Bradlees was an old department store, always standalone, not in malls, and it smelled like perfume and salty cardboard. The heat was always jacked up too high, and my mom spent way too long looking for shoes and bargains on blouses. My cotton piece of cloth kept me from losing my bearings, I’m sure of it. Over-stimulus and the combo of the heat and smells marched behind me in Bradlees, but my cloth acted like a shield.
Mork was different from a blankie, though. Yes, his texture comforted me, but I think it was also about the world I’d created in my mind. The reality that wasn’t. Fantasy authors will relate to this. He was my companion that wasn’t human. An opportunity to oversee a creative place in the corner of my heart and spirit. I built a world! A made-up scenario that imitated what I saw happening in the lives of my older babysitters and uncles. Going out to eat, bowling nights, having people over for cake and coffee, and maybe a getaway to somewhere like Atlantic City to play slot machines. Atlantic City overnight was the glamourous date night tryst of the 80s. My POV was simply a six-year-old with nothing but a Mork from Ork doll as a husband and parents with a robust social and family life. He traveled up and down the Garden State Parkway with me and my family, and nobody flinched.
Why was it so important to me to have a partner? I think I saw how it worked well for my parents. Their decisions about where to go for their day off were interesting to me, and I noticed that if my mom had the last word, everyone was pleased. If the decisions made it through the matriarchal checklist and quality control meter, our day would be delightful. But my dad was made for it, and it worked well for his disposition. I remember the two personalized zodiac plaques they had displayed in our garage. Scorpio and Libra, my dad being the latter. I remember connecting the symbolism of the scales and the neatness that was my father. I also remember being a little bit afraid of the depiction of the Scorpio, yet how fierce it felt to have a mom who embodied its strength. Don’t cross that venomous scorpion, ever. The two plaques, side by side, like my parents. Perhaps their zodiac signs sealed their fate, still being together since the early 1970s. What’s funny about the plaques is that my aunt and uncle had mugs of the same sentiment. One for her—a Virgo earth mother with long hair and a look of “I will help you with everything and anything you will ever need in life,” my uncle’s a Libra too, so he too had a set of balanced scales. My aunt and uncle are together after fifty-plus years of marriage, and whether or not their signs even matter, it’s a very early memory I have related to the inner workings of couple-dom.
As far as my texturally and creatively pleasing doll, Mork, I had decided he was the sign that best matches with my Aquarian heart. I didn’t know anything about what my sign stood for, but I knew mine carried a huge vat or container of water to provide for others. In my heart, I assigned Mork as the perfect mug to match mine. The plaque. We’d have imaginary dinners at restaurants after long days at the beach with our friends. We’d invite friends for cake and coffee on Saturdays and chat about grown up things. I know now, that sign is Sagittarius (for all who are wondering).
I remember snagging my mom’s zodiac paperback from her nightstand drawer— Linda Goodman’s Relationship Signs, publication date 1970ish. I read it over and over, as it spoke about compatibility and the nature of the signs. That set up a lot of notions for me as a teenager, and you can sure I became finely tuned in to my friends’ signs. It also might be responsible for why I can remember anyone’s birthday if they tell me once. Fun fact: I’m most drawn to Aries, Sags, Cancers, and Libras without evening thinking too hard about it. Taurus seem to lurk in my hallways too, but they perplex and make me want to pull my eyeballs out of my head sometimes. Sorry, bulls. It’s not always about you. And as far as the Aries, well, though I draw them in, they often cause me nothing but heartburn. With the exception of my grandmothers. I still can’t believe they were Aries, come to think of it. But I suppose the grandma dynamic overpowered it.
In the vein of dates and romance, there was one winner of a show that romanticized every notion of dating and love matches: The Love Boat. At every turn, the characters had dates on the giant cruise ship—-out at dinner, pairing up and glammed up for a night of dancing or pure posing while eating. Women wore and silky and slinky dresses and wet lipstick. Fingernails were painted in shimmery pinks, peaches, and reds. I was obsessed. The idea of a match between a set of people. Learning smells and touch language date after dinner date. Movie night after movie night. Three’s Company portrayed a less glitzy, middle-class night life, or if I want to be more accurate—San Diego middle-class twenty-somethings who frequented the Regal Beagle bar and restaurant. Always sunny, espadrilles in full effect. Janet and Terry always had the ultimate purse to pair with their shoes and double barrette combo, or in Janet’s case—her black eyelined purple shadowed eyes. As a kid I had the most detailed imagination when it came to pretending in my mind, that I was getting ready for a dinner date after a long day of either work at my Aunt Connie’s gift shop or a day tanning on the beach. (See the Nectarine Pit chapter too) The funny thing was, I was more concerned about the anticipation, the blush, the lipstick, and the hair more than the date himself. Of course, until Mork came into my life. When I got too old to carry Mork around, you can bet your bottom dollar I had real crushes on boys. When I fell, I fell hard because of course, the relationship world I built for me and Billy McMahon in my mind was more dramatic than anything in real life. I remember he loved pancakes, so in my imagination, I would come to visit him on a Saturday morning before a baseball game, and his mom would make us pancakes. We’d smile, laugh, and they’d comment how sweet of a girl I was, and how lucky Billy was to have met me. We were only eleven. We never had pancakes.
We cannot dismiss the idea of a kiss at the end of the date on my porch too. I have a distinct memory of showing my mom what I labeled at age seven—the soap opera kiss versus the sweet kiss. The soap opera kiss went like this: plant the kiss on your person, then twist your mouth, still closed, from side to side. That is how I innocently processed what I saw on T.V. So my mom would oblige and let me do it on her, as she laughed heartily. Then the sweet kiss: a peck on the lips, then a hug. Funny enough, I didn’t practice on my Mork doll like you the reader suspects. Only my mom got that love from me. Mork simply followed my lead from location to location.. Mork was my husband for a few months, then he got stuffed in my closet.
Nanoo. Nanoo.
If you see a woman in Doc Martens drooling over a 1964 Chevy Impala like it’s candy, it’s probably Elaina Parsons. Her first two books are Italian Bones in the Snow and Black Licorice. Elaina’s poems and prose have been published in various mags and journals. She’s the editor of 50 Give or Take with Vine Leaves Press and lives on the Jersey Shore with her husband and daughters. Her essay “I Said it Out Loud” was a 2021 finalist in the Anne Dillard CNF contest. Elaina is also an acquisitions reader for Pearson Education.