BIG, BLOOD-DRINKING, HUNGRY MONSTERS

Overheard in the grocery freezer aisle today, as a woman with two small children shopped nearby:

"Mommy, my imaginary friend wants to have 50 friends over tonight. And her imaginary friend also wants to have 50 friends over tonight."

"Oh?"

"They're big, blood-drinking, hungry monsters."

"Well, I'm glad you let me know."

I'd be curious as to what one feeds one hundred big, blood-drinking, hungry monsters. Sounds like one heck of a slumber party.

My favorite Pop-Culture Moment revolving around imaginary friends: the M*A*S*H episode in which Hawkeye resurrects his old imaginary friend Tuttle and works up paperwork giving him a stellar, if eccentric, service record. ("Religion? Reformed Druid.") Soon, everyone -- up to generals -- claims to be intimate friends with Tuttle ...

Never had imaginary friends myself as a child. Or now, for that matter :-) -- though every now and then I imagine I'm talking with Abraham Lincoln or John Quincy Adams or some other historical personage I admire. In a sense, I was in a prime demographic for it, a kind of solitary, bookish kid who was an only child -- the siblings I mention here from time to time were from my mother's previous marriage and are 17 and 15 years older than me, so we've never shared a household. Guess I never saw the point. I didn't know any other kids who had imaginary friends, either, or at least who admitted to doing so. Last week we published a wire story about imaginary friends, and how they are essentially a harmless, even healthy thing as long as they don't take over the child's reality.

Let's open it up: Have any of you had any experience with imaginary friends, either your own or your kids' or siblings'? What do you think about the concept?

Words: Madeleine L'Engle's Crosswicks Journal, Book I: A Circle of Quiet. Looks like I'll be done tonight.
Sounds & Images: Julia Ecklar's "The Phoenix" in my head. It is Julia Ecklar, right?
State O'Mind: Amused.