Where did my imagination go when I twiddled? I'll give you an example: Somewhere around the time I began school, someone gave me a box of animal crackers, a big deal for someone from a very lower middle-class family of five. The box itself resembled a circus car, and it had a string handle so you could carry your animal crackers around like a briefcase, if you wanted to. The crackers in my box were of Disney characters, Mickey and Donald and Pluto and Clarabelle Cow and a bunch of others. I twiddled my pencil, and, in my imagination, they all came alive within me, and I mean, like, these cartoon characters built a town in my stomach. They'd observe the outside world by looking out my mouth. I can't remember any of their adventures, but I do remember that Mickey was the villain. A few months, or maybe it was even a year or so later, someone gave me another box of animal crackers, and I tried to introduce the crackers I'd eaten that time to the ones already in my stomach, and that's when the entire fantasy fell apart.

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