The thing is, our daughters (and son, for that matter) are obsessed with the movie Frozen right now. In fact, I think everyone's daughters are obsessed with Frozen. The songs fill our house and our car and our heads. I ran 16 miles on Sunday with "Do You Want to Build a Snowman" on repeat in my brain. I suppose there are worse things to complain of. They love the music and at the heart of both the film and the songs lies a good message: trust in yourself, be strong.
Still, I am not completely settled on my stance on Princesses. Or Barbies. Or anything of the like. The thing is, Barbies are plain scary looking. Adara received a Barbie for Christmas last year. She tried to bend the Barbie's legs and sit her down in her paper dollhouse when we realized the doll couldn't sit down because her shorts were too tight! The whole thing was ridiculous with her unnatural proportions and made-up face. But is that what my almost-5 year old is really seeing when she plays with her Barbie? Most of the time the dolls are naked, she could care less whether they have on any clothes because really she is just using them for imaginative play. She uses them to act out a scene, one doll in each hand, two best friends playing "Kindergarten" together or taking a swim in the doll house pool. She can play with these things for hours on end, acting out little stories in hushed whispers, running around the house from room to room with two Barbies.
And as much as I despise their looks, watching her, I am reminded of another little girl who used to spend her days playing with Barbies. A little girl who was obsessed with her little dolls for many years, surely old enough to move on to more mature activities, yet she loved her imaginative play with Barbies. Twenty five years ago, that little girl was me. Watching my girls play with Barbies brings me back to Kelly Nagle's basement. Huddled in her unfinished play-room downstairs, we spent hours simply playing -- with each other and our imaginations -- with our Barbies.
Sometimes while out running, I'll pass a newly constructed fence. the drifting smell of cedar will put me right back there with Kelly, sifting through her Barbie bag together, picking out our favorites and creating our families, preparing for an afternoon full of adventure and imagination. What's so wrong with that? How can I deprive my daughter of a toy that provided some of my very best childhood and adolescent memories (Yes, I played with Barbies until I was an adolescent).
I think everything has a context. Life and lessons are not black and white. To me, princesses and Barbies lie somewhere in the gray. If my girls were sitting there ogling over the fake bodies of their dolls or talking about how pretty these dolls looked and parading them around, I would have a problem. For now, though, dolls and princesses to them are simply girls. Girls, whom, like themselves, are strong. Girls like Elsa who are brave and powerful. Girls like Anna who wear fancy dresses and ride horses and love their sisters.
Last week while Alan's parents were in town, we went hiking on a very steep single track section off Mulholland. Cesia wore a dress. She has worn a dress everyday for the past six months, if not longer. It used to bug me. I used to fight it, insisting she wear a sportier outfit and put on some shorts and a t-shirt to fit her ever-active lifestyle. She fought it more and I stopped caring. Why? Partly because you have to choose your battles and partly because that is just who Cesia is. Dresses make her feel girly and that is just fine with me. Hiking, running on trails and climbing rocks and trees makes her feel strong and adventurous and that is just fine with me. I am all for running skirts and post-workout dresses, in 100% support of embracing your femininity as well as your strength. We admire our muscles as well as our bruises, scrapes and skinned knees -- all marks of an adventurous day.
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| Hiking Solstice Canyon Saturday morning. |
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| My princess mountain climber. |
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