Only in Marin
Moms of preschoolers talk genderbending.
So this morning I stopped on my way out from dropping off Eli at school to talk to a couple of the other moms, both of whom have more than one son. Somehow we got on the topic of our sons' various adventures in genderbending: one loved the color pink (Eli did too until recently), one had a fascination with putting his hair up in ponytails and hairclips, Eli and his infamous (to me, anyway) "I want pink flowery sandals" incident.
Ok so none of these stories themselves were what were so interesting: what was interesting was when one of the moms was talking about how the kid's teachers and the other parents were razzing her husband for taking the ponytails out of his son's hair before going with him to the hardware store. Only in Marin do you get this feeling of parental guilt when you don't fully support your son's gender experimenting. Can you imagine that dad being razzed in say, Texas somewhere? I just find the whole thought amusing. I love where I live and at the same time I acknowledge that I'm surrounded by a delicate little bubble of leftover hippie goodness and it could pop at any moment.
And yes, I still feel bad that I didn't buy Eli the pink flowery sandals. Is that so wrong?
Too funny. As much as I love my hippy dippy Fairfax preschool, and as open as I am to honoring my childs inner spirit, I'd flinch if Max wanted to wear pink, ponytails, or other girly finery. For better or for worse, at 4.5 yrs he's starting to reject certain things as "for girls" although they are not nessessarily feminine things. For example, we were reading a book that had a picture of a hotel lobby and he said, "I don't like hotel lobbies - they are for girls." Whatever dude....
At the same time, if he turned out to be gay - I'm so fine with that. Gay men love their mamas. I'm aslo here to admit that right or wrong, if he was a girl who turned out to be a lesbian it might be harder for this girl to wrap her brain and heart around. Not that I'd stop loving her or her girlfriends or anything - but I think a teeny, tiny piece of my heart would break.