Gender Gap

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. " ~Dr. Seuss

When you found out you were going to be a parent, what was the first thing you really wanted to know? Boy or girl, right?  Whether you found out before the birth or at the birth, that's the one thing we are all dying to know. (I personally don't see any point in waiting - but that's for another post.)

Now imagine being so excited about your baby boy or girl, loving and nurturing that child for three or four years, then sending them to a school that refuses to identify your child by gender. Nobody - not the teachers, not the principal, not the other students, refers to him or her as "him" or "her." A preschool in Sweden is doing this. They're referring to the kids as a group, as "friends."

Sorry, friends, I just don't agree.

While I also don't agree with enforcing gender stereotypes, I can't support flat out ignoring gender. What about potty time? Will everyone have to stand to pee? Or sit for that matter?

My daughter is being raised in a house where her father does all of the cooking and most of the kitchen clean-up. Her mother pays the bills and is better at fixing most things. It's up to the parents to teach their children that it's ok for boys to cook and girls to assemble patio furniture.

At her school, there is a boy whose favorite color is pink. There's nothing wrong with that. There is another boy who loves dance class. I find nothing wrong with that, either. Nor is it wrong that I carried my baseball cards in a purse when I was a boy. You can read about that here. Those kids are busting the stereotypes, and I'm pretty sure they're doing it all by themselves.

Even the inflatable pool is princes themed

But sometimes, the stereotypes find the child. We tried to avoid the whole princess craze with our daughter. Didn't introduce her to them, buy her any toys or books or show her any movies with princesses. We weren't making a political statement. We just felt like they were a little cheesy and a lot cliche'. Well, guess who is fascinated by princesses anyway? We've got the nightgowns and the books and we watch the movies all of the time and when she plays dress-up daddy has to be the prince or the king.

Her choice. Naturally.

This past weekend, we were headed to a birthday party for one of her classmates. The boy had chosen a Spiderman theme for his party. As we drove there, my daughter volunteered, "Daddy, I hope there are girl superheroes at this party, like Wonder Woman."

My Feminist Superhero

Our little women's libber, perhaps? We probably won't know for a few more years. But she did get a pink Batman painted on her face at the party. Sorry... Batgirl.

These are her politics, not her parents'. Not that we disagree with them. During dinner one evening late in October of 2009, my wife and I were discussing the race for governor in New Jersey, and we asked our daughter, "Are you a Democrat or a Republican?"

Halloween 2009



"I'm a cupcake," she answered, because that's what she was dressing as for Halloween a week later.

A cupcake. A princess. Wonder Woman. Sweet, strong, independent. All words that describe my daughter. All things she chose. Based on gender? Probably. Based on nature or nurture? I think mostly nature, with a little bit of unintended nurture.

Because I knew she was going to be a princess the minute I found out we were having a girl.

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The Naked Truth

"Sometimes life seems like a dream, especially when I look down and see that I forgot to put on my pants." - Jack Handy

Thanks to my daughter, a few strangers at the Gap now know that I wear Papa Smurf boxer shorts. I was trying on pants in the dressing room while my wife was occupying the peanut. When I called my wife over for her opinion on whether my new threads were a good fit, my daughter refused to enter the dressing room.

Is Smurfy Sexy?

So now my wife wants to try something on and the peanut still won't budge, and for no other reason than we wanted her to. By this point, I had taken the pants off, revealing the aforementioned Papa Smurf boxers. Two women walk by the open door. Now I'm annoyed.

Still refusing to listen, I grab my daughter's arm and pull her into the dressing room with a stern, "Get in here now!" She freaks out. I try to calm her down, for her, for me, and for the people overhearing this chaotic scene from the other dressing rooms.

I tell her I had to do it because "it's inappropriate for strangers to see daddy in his underwear" (Papa Smurf underwear, mind you).

She brushed me off, then moved on. Maybe she didn't think anything of it because my daughter herself finds every opportunity she can to take off her pants. I will come home and she will be lying on the couch watching television, in her undies. Or playing in her playroom. When does this start being weird? At what age? At this point, I think it's mostly a comfort thing. It's been hot out, and we don't turn on the air conditioning unless it's absolutely necessary.

But there have been times when we try to compel her to wear pants, leading to a tantrum.

Thus, I've invented a new term: the "temper pantrum:" when your child throws a fit because you're forcing them to wear pants.

That's an actual phone call I received from my wife one morning at work. "I'm going to be late for work because she was so difficult this morning." So I ask, "Why she was so difficult?" The answer: "Because she didn't want to wear pants."

I was speechless. What do you possibly say to that?

When I picked her up later that day, I asked the teachers, hypothetically, what they would do if we dropped her off in the morning and she weren't wearing pants. "That's fine," one of them politely responded. "We know you guys do your best."

If our best is sending our daughter out in the world half-naked, then we're in trouble, lady.

To take this from the ridiculous to the even more blog-worthy... one morning she and I were horsing around in her playroom. Wrestling on the floor. My wife was sitting on the couch, cheering us on. We were having a great time. Laughing out loud, tears in your eyes kind of funny. She'd jump on me. I'd tickle her. I was truly afraid for my safety at certain points because she was hurtling herself at me with such reckless abandon.

All of a sudden, she ran out of the room. Was she getting something? No... she was getting rid of something. Her pants. We played for another minute, and she ran out again. Now what? She returned without a shirt. We kept playing, she only in her underwear. I said out loud, through my laughs, "ok this is getting a little weird."

She left a third time. My wife, trying to catch her breath, simply coughed out forebodingly, "Oh, no..." I thought to myself, she's not going to come back naked is she?

Of course she is. "Honey," I attempted as our laughter reached hysterical heights. "Remember how daddy tells you sometimes that things are inappropriate? Like when you ask me to tickle (my mother-in-law)?" She's paying me no attention as she belly flops on top of me. I lift her naked kicking body, holding her above me like Supergirl and try to explain through her giggles. "You have to put your underwear back on," I say while repressing my laughter. Followed by the jackpot: "Wrestling naked is inappropriate."

You can't expect a four year-old to sit there and listen and comprehend everything you're saying, especially after you've gotten her riled up like I did. Especially when you're throwing around big words like inappropriate.

But my God... I hope that last lesson sinks in eventually and sticks for as long as possible.

Speaking of "inappropriate," click on this and read if you dare. But be warned: TMI. No... really. EXTREME TMI.

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