Madison’s current obsession and cute/fat
She’s been listening to all of our old story CDs and these I don’t mind. Her favorites last week were All Spirits Sing, which I can get behind despite the “Tise Old Wurtle” song because of the “Light Up the World” song and then The Seal Maiden, which is gorgeous with not one sour note throughout. But she wanted some new ones so I was going through a forgotten stash of Noah CDs and handed them to her. The one she’s ended up playing over and over and over is a mix CD of old rock and roll and motown that I made for Noah when he wanted to know who this Elvis person is and her favorite song is the first one: Chantilly Lace. And I’m pretty dang tired of hearing the Big Bopper go, “Hello-o-o-o-o Ba-by!”
Also she’s started saying, “I’m not going to cry anymore, Mommy, because big girls don’t cry.” So Frankie Avalon is totally undoing all the hard work of Free to Be You and Me who’s been telling her “It’s All Right to Cry” because crying takes the sad out of you.
Then yesterday she was running around the house singing about cuteness when she suddenly pointed her little finger at me, sitting innocently in the rocking chair trying to read a novel and said, “YOU’RE not cute because you are FAT!”
Well! I was, naturally, offended being to my own mind absolutely adorable as in “worthy of adoration.”
“Who says I can’t be cute AND fat?” I demanded, knowing she wasn’t sophisticated enough to answer, “The media!” so onward I went. “People can be cute and skinny, cute and short, cute and tall and they can be cute and fat.”
She looked doubtful.
“I may not be beautiful like a princess,” I said, acknowledging that there is nothing fancy about me and knowing her love of all things fancy. “But I am beautiful for my own self.” I added that many people who love me, not the least being Daddy, would argue pro-cuteness for me.
Contrite she came and kissed me and patted me and agreed that I am both beautiful and squishy, proving this by squishing me contentedly.
“Can you think of other people who are beautiful and fat?”
She thought awhile and named some people who are indeed beautiful and fat but then she said, “And Abby” only Abby isn’t fat not even by American media standards so then I realized she was using “fat” as a euphemism for “big” as in “grown” and that she brought this up because she’s been talking about things being little and cute like tiny toys, where she’ll go, “Oh that is CUTE!” So she’s not actually being size-ist so much as assuming the definition of “cute” includes “little.”
Still, seeing as how I feel fiercely protective of this girl-child’s self esteem I feel all right about coming out with both arms swinging. My girly is a paragon of beauty but the idiots who publish women’s magazines may not realize this; she’s going to need to be her own source of affirmation.
We love the Seal Maiden, too. I used to sing the Cradle Song to Rebecca when she was a baby. We don’t have a television, which is partly just circumstance, the old one broke ten years ago and we didn’t replace it right away and then we kept on not replacing it. These days, it’s partly to avoid the bombardment of keeping “the media” and all their crap about beauty out of my girl’s home, ya know? It creeps in anyway
One day I was admiring her when she’d come up with a really groovy outfit and she told me she’d never be beautiful because of her fat cheeks (which she doesn’t believe me she’ll grow out of). I thought I would die on the spot. So yeah, both arms swinging is the right move.
I know how to write a proper sentence, really I do. *eyeroll*