Tales from Toyland

After playing in the nursery for many years, Alan, who was the lord and master of the place, grew bored, perhaps, as all children do, of toys and nurseries. This fickle nature follows us all to adulthood and causes much trouble, but as far as Alan was concerned, he was not concerned at all. “The toys will look after themselves,” he thought.
Naturally, once the master left Toyland, all its usually inanimate inhabitants began to discuss who ought to rule in Alan’s stead; who indeed would be the new master?
All the toys agreed that it ought to be Teddy the bear. He was the first toy in Toyland, so his wisdom and experience were indispensable and he was, therefore, by right the best candidate for the job.
Teddy’s rule, however, only lasted for a very short time; he was an old and much withered toy. Once upon a time he had been quite a handsome bear but now all the old pomp was gone; his stuffing had become rather depressed and he looked thin and weary, almost grizzly. Though he had really wanted to secure the future of Toyland as a prosperous one, unfortunately his age and illness got the better of him and in some unknown part of his own domain he was picked up by the cleaning lady and that was that.
A short, sad and wounded history of Toyland, after the demise of Teddy, shows that most aspiring leaders were either dishonest to begin with or became corrupt as time went by. The system was flawed; once you have access to excess, it doesn’t take long to long for everything!
Every now and then a good and moral toy did manage to acquire power through popular demand…but got shot at and killed under mysterious circumstances. Nobody could ever figure out who was responsible for these deaths even though it was quite obvious that the only toys who had guns were the toy soldiers.

General Tin became the leader after a series of illogical events that most toys did not care about since he had, in the process of becoming leader, got rid of the Tailless Lion; this lion was a particularly useless one and quite universally ignored, apart from the fact that he was, somehow, the leader. His brother, the Tail was somewhat more capable but was only just a tail; disembodied parts were useful but not quite what the toys wanted in a leader.
General Tin did a good job of getting all the Educational toys -that Alan had always hated- on his side and with the help of this utterly boring lot, managed to impose a couple of odd laws that secured his seat of power for nearly a decade; at the same time he had single handedly got rid of the Justice League action-figures that had been trying to thwart his plans. The tri-cycle who had been an avid supporter of the Tailless Lion, showed his double nature by breaking away from him and forming a significant alliance with the General. Later he showed his true triple nature and joined forces with a Headless Horse.
Barbie’s grandmother was an unusual toy in Alan’s nursery. She had initially been a resident of Alan’s sister’s room but somehow had been left in the nursery a few years ago. In all this time she had learned how to speak like the natives but you could still sense an accent when she spoke. She was entirely useless too but always maintained that her father, the Jack-in-the-box, (another well known leader in the history of Toyland) was a good enough reason for her to be the next leader of Toyland. The Jack-in-the-box’s head had been ripped off by General Tin’s ancestor, General Wood, so the enmity between Barbie’s grandmother and General Tin was apparent and undying. Oddly enough, Barbie’s grandmother’s circular sort of logic for being elected convinced all the toys as well, who didn’t really put much thought into what they did or what they agreed to collectively. The Wise Owl and the stuffed mule were always trying to explain to the toys how they were not making the right choices but they had very little effect.
Meanwhile the Tailless Lion, who was also rallying support against General Tin in order to get back his former office, began using the cause of the Justice League as a motivation for the masses to vote for him. Barbie’s grandmother saw the opportunity and joined forces with the Tailless Lion and tried really hard to get rid of the problematic General as well.
Now, although their joint efforts did culminate in the General being dethroned, in the process, Barbie’s grandmother got shot and killed at a public gathering. While the toys were busy trying to figure out how this might have happened, a strange and unfamiliar toy, known only as the Headless Horse, reared his sinister, headless head and laid claim to the leadership of Toyland on the basis that he was in fact Barbie’s grandfather, or in other words, he was Barbie’s grandmother’s husband. “I am your leader because my wife just died yesterday!” declaimed the Headless Horse and all the toys nodded their approval.
Toys are an emotional group of inanimate objects and so they readily accepted this new development without consideration and hailed the Headless Horse as the new leader. “He has only just lost a loving wife, we must let him rule over us all in order to make amends for a crime we did not commit!” said the toys.
“But he’s headless! How will he care for all the toys? He can’t even see!” said the Wise Owl, but nobody thought along those lines; rational thinking was temporarily unavailable.
“Mister ninety-percent is what he is,” said the toy mule with a bitter chuckle, “unfortunately it’s the ten-percent which he doesn’t have that is really important!”
“For the love of sanity and reason!” exclaimed the Cricket Bat, “Can you not see that you have elected a leader who doesn’t even have a proper head?” but nobody was willing to listen to a piece of wood. “You’re better in the Cricket field than in political affairs, so keep out and stay out!” said the toys in unison.

The Headless Horse did not have a head but everyone could tell he was smiling all the time. He was quite a happy horse, now that he was leader. Since he didn’t have a mouth -which is an inconveniently small opening- he could eat a lot more than a regular toy by simply tipping everything over into his severed neck. No chewing required, no waiting necessary, simply tip everything and anything in and then forget about it. The constantly smiling Headless Horse was well known for eating apple jam. All the toys thought that the poor chap was only trying to put up a brave front for the sake of his people and not to dwell too much on how his wife had died such a violent death. “He’s a capital fellow,” said the toy Truck that didn’t have fuel to run on anymore “he eats jam to drown the memory of his poor old wife…it’s only natural.” Unfortunately his overeating had created a dearth of apple jam in Toyland.
As time went by, the toys slowly began to realize that life in Toyland was getting progressively worse. Food had become really expensive because it was so rare to find; most of it was gobbled up by the leader. Energy supply was down as well. Nobody knew what to do about that either.
“I think society has been divided into the proletariat and the bourgeois…the haves and the have-nots” said the Wise Owl very solemnly. “And I fear that if certain steps towards eliminating class difference aren’t taken, there will be a massive uprising whereby all the poor toys will beat up the rest of us and a bloody revolution will be the result.”

“I don’t see what the problem is…everything is just fine and dandy. I don’t see why these prophets of doom are always trying to paint such a horrid picture.” said the Headless Horse.

“Well obviously he doesn’t ‘see’ what the problem is; he can’t even see anything! He doesn't have a head!” said the Cricket Bat. He was so annoyed with how silly the toys were that he decided to not bother anymore. “Let them reap what they have sown.” he said and left.

At this juncture, the Wise Owl’s prophetic words began to come true. Groups of poor toys were to be seen skulking around in the corners of the nursery, discussing hunger and sadness. All the well-off toys were feeling paranoid and nervous. Everyone seemed to be staring at everyone else’s hands and pockets. Once the Wise Owl died -of old age, stress and grammatical mistakes- all hell broke loose: The toys charged the Presidential Palace where the Headless Horse sat smiling as ever. But before they could really do all that they wanted to do to their chosen leader, the nursery door opened, signaling a new era in the history of Toyland. Alan’s younger brother had been born a few months ago and it was unanimously decided by the powers that be that young Donald would succeed Alan as lord and master of the nursery.

“What wretched looking toys are these?” wondered Donald’s mother, as she settled him in the new room, “How emaciated and savage looking they have become without Alan’s supervision! Well Donald, it’s up to you now to tame these old barbarians all over again and I wish you luck and I hope you get along fine.” She smiled at her child with beaming affection. And then in a feigned voice of authority, she said: “Remember to be firm with them Donald; be firm and authoritative! Don’t let them sense any weakness in you. These funny colored savages aren’t used to civility and can only respect someone who is a blatant superior. So good luck!” said Donald’s mother as she closed the door.
All the toys remained where they were, silently watching their new master, awestruck and beguiled.