Monday, August 23, 2010

Sparkle and Ash

I find myself the mother of a little boy whose favorite color is pink, who is undeniably drawn to anything that sparkles or shimmers, and who always wants to be Princess Fiona when we "play Shrek".

This same little boy is also just discovering the concepts of fighting and violence. Every other sentence out of his mouth seems to be about fighting. "These dinosaurs are fighting" "Quynh and I were just fighting" "Let's play fighting -- it might be a little violent, OK Mama?" Maybe he only says all that to Push My Buttons, because he's also started using rude words* just to get a rise out of me.

Today at the mall he wanted me to buy him three pieces of "back to school" clothing -- (1) a pink t-shirt covered in glittery peace signs, (2) a pink and grey shirt with a sparkly princess crown on the front, and (3) Fire Chief rain boots (to go with his fire fighter t-shirt and fire fighter rain jacket). Not that women can't be firefighters. And not that male firefighters can't wear pink glitter under their gear.....just sayin'.

I bought him all three pieces.

He seems to be right in the midst of figuring all this stuff out on his own, I just hope he doesn't learn the societal norms via a mean kid at school the day he decides to wear his princess shirt. Perhaps pairing it with the fire fighter boots will turn it from Girly to Avant Garde in a very Project Runway type of way.





*His knowledge of rude words/phrases currenlty consists of "stupid," "hate," and "you're disgusting."

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