My mother, like many other mothers out there, wanted a little girl that she could dress up in pretty clothes and show off. It's true that I was a cute little thing, all big blue eyes and auburn curls, and I looked absolutely darling in the little outfits she got me. So it was understandably quite frustrating for her when I wanted to go outside and frolic with my friend in the nice new clothes she'd bought me. Once she bought me a pretty white dress with lace and frills and a lovely lace collar. I promptly went outside, tried to climb over a fence, and remained there, red-faced, shrieking and kicking, hanging by the skirt of the dress which had gotten caught on the post. My father had to come get me down, trying very hard not to laugh in the process.
After that, my mother dressed me in overalls for when I played outside.
The thing is, I wasn't what you might call a "typical" tomboy. I liked the pretty dresses my mother bought me. I enjoyed looking nice for parties, although because I was a very introverted child I generally found the parties overwhelming. I liked having ribbons in my hair, and I used to colour my fingernails with my markers so that I would have "nail polish" on. I didn't ardently desire to be a boy, except for those times when people would tell me I couldn't do or have something that was "only for boys."
My mother and I didn't truly need to compromise, the way I hear some mothers feel they have compromise with their tomboyish girls. Instead, my mother got to know me for who I was, and when I was little she never once told me I couldn't do something because I was a girl. (That tune changed when I was a teenager, but when I was a little girl? The words never crossed her lips.) My mother realised that it wasn't realistic to want me to be demure and "proper" all the time, and she worked with that. She wanted me to have fun, to be happy, and if that mean dressing me in overalls half the time or more, then so be it.
As I grew older, I found myself at odds with most girls my age. I didn't own any Barbies until I was 10, and someone gave me a couple for my birthday. I didn't really know how to "play Barbies," so my Barbies ended up going on adventures and climbing imaginary volcanoes made out of my bedclothes and a few judiciously placed chairs. There was no pink in my room (except for my bedspread, which my mother bought for me when I got my "big girl bed" and which I kept until I was nearly twenty), because pink was a "girl colour," and I knew I wasn't really like other girls. I was a girl in essence, but not especially on the surface. I had no interest in boys, which other girls seemed to develop starting as early as eight years old. I didn't understand the fascination with the New Kids on the Block (yes, that was the boy band that was incredibly popular when I was twelve, which should give you an idea of my age), and I thought makeup was pretty ridiculous.
I've never bothered to dissect my feelings about being a girl when I was young. I figure it's equal parts gender identity and internalised misogyny, with some other issues thrown in for good measure. We're constantly being told that being a woman is less desirable than being a man. Therefore anything that's associated with womanhood is automatically inferior. I refused for years to have anything to do with the colour pink. From the age of about seven to the age of twenty-five, actually, when a friend finally convinced me to buy a hot pink sleeveless top for an outfit, which turned out to look pretty damned fabulous on me.
Slowly I became more attuned to the underlying misogyny in so many of the messages I had internalised, and began to consciously examine my motivations for "disliking" things. I read a lot of articles that, for instance, pointed out how ridiculous it was to look down on romance novels. A genre of fiction written primarily by women for women? It must be inferior! Never mind that it has about the same percentage of good and bad writers as any other kind of fiction. But we've been brainwashed to think of those novels as being "trash."
I digress.
The point is that, in all these years, I've never been pushed so hard to review all my opinions about "girly" things than in the past few months since Bean has started expressing more and more interest in things that would be considered "girlish." Barbies? Check. Pink, purple and sparkly Check. Skirts and tights and Tinkerbell? Check. Check, check, check.
So what's my role as a parent? Or step-parent, in my case? All this stuff makes Bean happy, and since I want him to be a happy, well-adjusted kid, totally comfortable with who he is, then I need to make sure that my own hang-ups don't rub off on him. Just because I grew up thinking pink was undesirable doesn't mean I should pass that along to him. Much like my mother had to learn who I was and work with the side of me that loved climbing trees and playing with swords as well as the side of me that liked to pretend I was a princess (because I totally wanted to be a princess and have a pony of my very own), I am getting to know every side of Bean's personality.
Therefore I have come to reconcile myself entirely with pink in all its glorious shades and nuances. From bubble gum to Barbie to electric pink, I now embrace the colour with every ounce of my being. I may not have played Barbies when I was little, but if Bean wants me to play with him? Then I will happily join him on the floor with every single Barbie at my disposal to let him stretch his imagination as far as it will go.
The great thing about children is that they let you be a child again yourself every so often, and now I get the added joy of having a second childhood filled with pink and purple and sparkles and fairy wings. Every day I'm at home I can look forward to a new discovery.
(Yes, that's me when I was about Bean's age. It's the only photo I have at my disposal, but my mother has 24 albums' worth. :P)
