Doodles is in a gymnastics class. He’s been taking gymnastics for about seven months now, and he adores it. <\/p>\n
During the next session, the entire gym will be putting on shows. His class will be doing a “Chicken Little” routine. It’s all a big sham, I think, to get the parents to fork over money for costumes and then to pay an admission to watch the show. I feel like this is my inauguration into the world of just dumping all the contents out of my wallet for extracurricular activities.<\/p>\n
Anyway, that wasn’t my point. The point is, the girls will be wearing yellow leotards with yellow hair scrunchies that they’ll put around their ankles, like chickens. The boys will be wearing black shorts and a white T-shirt. Now, if you were a 2 1\/2 year old, which outfit would you<\/i> rather wear? Exactly. Now compound that by putting one of your two best friends–who is a girl–in the class and she<\/i> gets to wear the yellow leotard and hair scrunchy. Doodles declared today that he wants to wear the yellow leotard. <\/p>\n
What to do? Do you know, as much as I worship the Free to Be You and Me<\/i><\/a> album, I hardly ever play it for Doodles. And one of the main reasons is the song “William’s Doll.”<\/a> For those who lived under a rock in the ’70s–or with Republicans–the song is about a little boy who wants a doll and his friends make fun of him and his father doesn’t want him to have one. His grandmother finally gives him a doll because “someday he is going to be a father, too.” I loved this song growing up. I still love it. But I don’t want Doodles listening to this song because it would never even occur to him at this point that boys don’t<\/i> traditionally play with dolls. We have some dolls at home that once or twice he’s done something with, but I do know that he has enjoyed playing with dolls at school. I’m afraid if he hears the song, it’ll put the notion into his head that boys don’t play with dolls.<\/p>\n