With six come some new and interesting challenges in the arena of child rearing, especially in the new world order that Boss and I are attempting to establish. For those of you not in the know, Boss is my partner, who has recently moved to the land of the free and deep fried in the interest of establishing something of a life with Pink One and myself. We are going on 1 week since she has arrived, and despite a couple of “honey, did you know having a family was both hard and exhausting?” moments, she’s settling very nicely.
Part of being a Mediocre Mama, such as myself, is the ever present knowledge that you are kind of phoning it in about….63% of the time when it comes to parenting. Personally, I’ve made a tentative peace with that, Boss however, coming from the land of no kids and only personal responsibility, is not ready to admit defeat. Thus she demands more of herself as a potential co-parent, which also means she demands more of me, considering I am the ACTUAL parent, and its been made clear that as far as Pink One goes, I’m in charge. But if you can’t tell by her internet pseudonym…well she’s the Boss pretty much everywhere else.
Okay, so I jest, but really this is a very good thing for all of us. Pink One has gotten away with A LOT of shit over the past six years. Mommy is SOMETHING of a pushover when it comes to her baby…I think I have far too much estrogen in my body or something. She does this thing…she looks at me (typically after I have demanded she do something she finds inconvenient at the time) with those big brown eyes, and those big buck teeth and says “but mommy, I just wanna be with you…” I swear to god, she can even muster tears should the mood strike her, and I either completely snap out of exhaustion or weep uncontrollably…or somewhere in between the two.
So Boss finds this ridiculous…as I suppose most outsiders would, because it is completely obvious that Pink One is manipulating her squishy, soft hearted…yet somehow irrationally volatile mother to whatever it is she requires at that moment. We have now instituted a code word for when this is occurring and I am on the verge of either weeping or selling her to gypsies. The code word is “buttons”. Tell no one. When this word is uttered, it is meant to snap me from my estrogen and wide eyed stupor and bring me back to reality, sticking to my guns and moving forward with new found resolve for whatever request/threat I have laid down.
Along with the fun of discipline and consistency, Pink One has discovered a sense of fashion in her 6th year. Until recently, her wardrobe has predominately consisted of hand me downs from various friends, thrift store finds, the occasional tye dyed shirt, and whatever her auntie has picked up with the latest pop idol emblazoned across the front of it. Her hair, while technically no longer pink, had light touches of the dye I used over 2 years ago just at the ends and had become an un-manageable mane of crazy. Looking at her…well she absolutely SCREAMED 5 year old. Boss and I decided that it would be a good idea to take her in for a hair cut and some new clothes to celebrate her entry into the world of six. Besides we were fucking sick of telling her to quit chewing her hair or we would shave her head, and if she tried to wear the I heart Beer t-shirt to school one more time…well it wasn’t going to be pretty. Also, somewhere in the last year she developed a rather strong aversion to underpants…no matter how big they were they were somehow too small…I don’t know, and because, like I said, I phone it in 63% of the time, I was willing to let it go for quite a while. But now we are six and underpants are part of being six. I read about a brand they have at Old Navy that supposedly works well for kids with sensory issues so I thought what the hell, we’ll give it a shot and see if we can’t make this child at least APPEAR normal.
When we arrive at the salon, Pink One is completely stoked to tell the lady EXACTLY what sort of hair cut she wants. Up until last week, it had been a battle to even suggest that the hairs be cut because our latest obsession was growing our hair ala the movie Tangled for use in escaping our bunk bedded prison. Boss, being ever so much smarter than I am sometimes, reminded the Pink One that long hair equals long mornings of washing, drying brushing and styling, and if there is one thing Pink One hates more than doing what she’s told, its effort of any kind. Suddenly, a haircut seemed like the best idea in all of the lands.
So please note the exchange between Pink One and her new BFF the stylist at Master Cuts.
Stylist: So what do you think kiddo? How do you want your hair?
Pink One: I want Justin Bieber hair
Stylist (looking from Me to Boss and back again as we nod in compliance with Pink Ones wish): Oh yeah? Well that’s my favorite haircut to do, so you are in luck!
Pink One (very serious): good, I want the bangs, and I want to look just like Justin Beiber and I want Aravis (her friend from school) to be totally jealous
Stylist: ok, I haven’t done this cut on a girl before, but I think we can manage it!
(snip and cut and snip and cut and final pink hairs to the floor later)
Stylist: There you go! What do you think?! Can you do the hair flip?
Pink One (appraisingly): *moves head from side to side slowly, brushes perfectly waxed bangs to the side* Yes…Aravis will be SO jealous…I looke JUST like Justin Beiber
And then she TOTALLY does the hair flip…if only there were a way to properly illustrate this moment via text…it was inspiring. She positively strutted from the salon and on to Old Navy where she procured a new jean skirt to compliment her pink cow girl boots, and a pair of white rhinestone sunglasses ala Kurt Cobain circa 1992.
My. Kid. Is. AWESOME.
She was so excited to go to school today and strut her stuff you wouldn’t even believe it. Some may find her desire to get what may be considered a “boy” haircut curious, but we are not ones to enforce uneccessary gender roles and I’m pro her expressing herself in whatever way she deems appropriate, as long as she’s wearing underpants.
Besides, I will take wanting to BE Justin Beiber over wanting to DATE Justin Beiber any day of the week.
(Beibs) (PinkOne Sporting her new Sweib)
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