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Cole claims credit for the mannequin craze

Burt's Eye View

The latest social media craze is the mannequin challenge. That’s when a cluster of people hold poses like statues while a person with a camera weaves around the bodies to post the tableau to Twitter or other social sites.

It’s sort of like a giant game of freeze tag played by grownups.

The biggest difference is that when we were 7 or 8, the kids you froze might have stayed in place, but they never shut up. “Frozen” kids continued to holler warnings and scream for teammates to dash by and unfreeze them.

In the mannequin challenge, a premium is placed on no movement, not even talking. Sometimes, during some of the more stressful times at work, I want to jump and yell, “Mannequin challenge!” It might go over better than, “I’m crawling under my desk to take a nap.”

But the coolest thing about the mannequin challenge is that I invented it.

Well, not the social media part. There were no such things as Twitter or cellphones when I created the phenomenon in 1965 or so. Maybe that’s why it never caught on.

I was about 6 years old and being schlepped around another department store. Somehow, Mom always ended up in the women’s department, which bored me to tears.

“Stop crying,” she said. “I’m almost done.”

“Almost” in grownup talk means 12 minutes — plus half of forever.

Since cellphones and video games hadn’t yet been invented yet, kids had to figure out other forms of entertainment.

I decided to become a mannequin.

I picked out a new mom among the store mannequins, climbed onto the pedestal beside her and froze.

I don’t think I was wearing clothes from that store. My pants probably had a patch sewn on one or both knees because back then, moms made kids keep wearing stuff until we outgrew them and handed our outfits down to the next sibling in line.

It didn’t matter. I went on display. Anytime someone walked by, I held my breath. No grownup took note of the little mannequin boy in the patched pants digging sand with an imaginary shovel or holding the mommy mannequin’s hand or pointing like an explorer to the toy department.

Finally, another bored little boy wandered by. He stopped. I held my breath. He studied me. I tried not to blink. He looked away. I changed positions. When he turned back, I held my breath again. The boy’s eyes bulged. He ran.

I saw him tug at a lady’s skirt. “Mommy, the mannequin moved.”

By the time the kid managed to drag his mom over to the pedestal, I was gone. Grownups meant trouble, so I dove into the center of a circular rack of winter coats and froze again so as not to rustle any of the fabric.

I heard the kid whine, “Honest, Ma, there was a boy mannequin right there. He had his finger poked in his nose and when I looked again, he didn’t.”

A lady’s voice snapped. “Come along and stop making things up. I’m almost done.”

I heard the boy cry.

Wherever you are, kid, I’m sorry. You can show your mom this confession. I was there. But I couldn’t risk your mom discovering me and telling my mom. We mannequins can scamper pretty quickly when challenged.

— Challenge Cole at bcole@tribtoday.com or on the Burton W. Cole page on Facebook.

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