Doing something right

October 14, 2013October 14, 2013Leave a comment

I have been reinforcing to Maria how special and unique she is since she arrived in this world.

I managed to score a personalized autograph from Gloria Steinem to Ri before Ri could say her first word. I read stories about strong women to her while we rocked to sleep. She met throngs of incredible female role models through her life: grandmas, great grandmas, aunts, cousins, colleagues, friends. Recently, after she made some quip about not “being skinny like other girls”, I taught her about affirmations.

“I am beautiful. I am funny. I am caring. I am strong. I listen to people.” These are a few of the affirmations she recited to me and her words were pure poetry to my mama/female ears.

So why would I be at all amazed at her response to me as I was fretting about mingling with my superiors at a work event Saturday evening?

“Mom, you just need to be yourself.”

I stared out my car window and smiled. Then I reached my hand to the back seat and felt her hand clasp mine. Our connection lifted me through the entire evening.

A Mighty Girl

May 27, 2013May 27, 2013Leave a comment

I have a son who at age four pulled a Maxim magazine off the grocery store shelf and proclaimed “she’s hot!”

Why? Not because I, or his sister, dress in tight clothes and short skirts. And certainly not because his dad is riding around with him whistling at women.

I have a daughter who put on a shirt yesterday morning and pronounced “my belly sticks out of this shirt. I’m not pretty.” This declaration after I have told Ri a thousand times that she is beautiful and amazing. And that has been reaffirmed over and over by her grandparents and dad and cousins. So why does she say such nonsense?

Hmmm…. could it be the magazines (Maxim is among many), the tv shows (“America’s Top Model” comes to mind), the media focus on all things thin and “perfect” and superficial, or the companies who market princesses with big boobs and size 0 waists to young girls.

When I was five and begged for a Barbie, I got Dusty. She was a flat-chested “barbie” with sandy brown hair cut in a straight bowl around her face, wearing jean sorts and riding a horse. And Ri wonders why I despise dresses to this day. She was my ideal. She’s who I played with every morning. I grew up in Clifton – I saw all sorts of women walking around town. Big, little, pierced, saggy, firm – you name it. And they were all beautiful in their own right.

But I still squeezed the fat rolls on my belly at night as I laid in bed. “If I could just lose this, I’d be so much prettier.” So even with my forward thinking, feminist parents, I still got caught in the trap.

I appreciate Mighty Girl drawing attention to Disney’s revamp of the young girl in Brave from a strong, every day looking heroine to a dress-off-the-shoulder, made-up princess. Sometimes I catch myself dismissing these pleas for action because I’ve heard them over and over again. But then I get one more plea and am reminded that if we didn’t have such over-glamorization and “sexing up” of our girls, there wouldn’t be so many pleas.

Mighty Girl is doing critical work to help our girls see themselves as soulful, intelligent, strong, courageous, opinionated people – not sex objects and eye candy.

When Ri squeezed one of Mario’s friends the other day, Mario yelled out “My sister is really strong, Quinn! She can hurt you!” And when Mario needed help on his bike, he knew Ri would be at his side (“you got it Mario; don’t be scared little guy!”). I appreciate that Mario sees his sis as a strong girl.

Most recently, Ri has fallen in love with softball. She is not the strongest batter but she has been persevering through missed swings and not giving up.

“Heile Menkedick Ionno’s don’t give up!” she chirps at me, repeating the words I have drilled into her head for years as she takes another swing.

Keep it up, Ri, and don’t worry about bellies. You are beautiful.

Can a Woman

February 12, 2013February 12, 2013Leave a comment

I have been crushed with work lately. So when I called the courthouse yesterday to confirm that Maria’s Girl Scout troop could still meet with a female judge during our tour that afternoon and was told “not sure,” I was ready for my head to spin around 100 times and my mouth to spit out fire. I expressed (in a cordial, polite manner, of course) how important it was for these girls to see a female judge and hung up the phone confident that it would happen.

And it did.

Maria and her troop of 7 and 8 year old girls met Judge Kim Brown. Before that though, they walked through a metal detector, which may have provided the most fun of the entire trip ( actually, it was probably second to the tunnel walk).

Before meeting the Judge, the girls visited the jury room. We talked about what a jury does and asked them if their parents had been jurors. However, all of our questions fell on deaf ears. The girls were more intrigued with the giant tvs. The first question posed: “what movies do jurors get to watch?” That question prompted a series of discussions amongst the girls about movies they loved and had recently seen. Not quite the captive audience I wanted.

After checking out the vending machines and bathroom (with a shower!), we headed to Judge Brown’s courtroom. The girls’ mouths dropped as they entered. Questions bounced all over – “who sits at the tables”, “does the judge use her gavel”, where does the jury sit”?

Surprisingly, all the chatter ceased when Judge Brown entered the room. It’s as if they innately knew to be quiet (either future lawyers or they are going to be respectful defendants one day).

Judge Brown talked with them about running for judge and about using her gavel and about the cases she hears. They sat and listened taking glances over at the juror box and up at her bench. All of those little minds taking in the atmosphere. I was hoping the presentation would have been a little more kid-friendly but I think the girls would have taken away what they ended up taking away all the same. And that is that they can choose whatever path calls to them. They’ve got a great big, exciting world in front of them and it’s theirs to gulp up. If Ri takes away one nugget from the trip, I hope it is that.

We ended our time with the Judge by singing her a song titled appropriately “Can a Woman.” The girls belted it out so that any one in the courthouse could hear.

I stood across from the girls to videotape them and wanted to shout “Amen” with every “Yes I Can” they sang. I wanted to hoist every one of them on my shoulders and reinforce that the sky is the limit. The power and confidence in that courtroom during that song was palpable and I will work like mad to keep it that way as Ri moves into pre-teen and teen years. Those girls will struggle together, laugh together, yell together over their school years like all of us remember doing with our girlfriends. And when they need a boost, I just hope they remember the confidence they exuded when they sang this song together.

Planting positive seeds for our girls

September 5, 2012September 5, 2012Leave a comment

I don’t know many people who could pull off running shorts with pink cowboy boots but Ri does it with class! I love that she has her own unique style and she isn’t worried about what other kids at school will think.

When she walked downstairs, I stepped back from the counter and said “I love that you have your own look, Ri.” She responded “I may just be a fashion designer one day, mom.”

I try to reinforce in her that girls don’t have to conform to the latest trends in magazines or on tv; they don’t have to have their hair styled perfectly or their skinny jeans; they don’t need to look like Barbie. I think it’s sinking in somewhat (although she still loves to wear eyeshadow – ugh).

I read a great article in the Huffington Post last night that reminded me to stray away from comments about Ri’s appearance and focus instead on Ri’s hobbies and interests. The author talks about the natural inclination to say to a little girl “look at you! You are so pretty in that dress! Aren’t you gorgeous in those shoes!” but how we need to stop ourselves and instead focus on non-cosmetic attributes. The author asked the little girl about her favorite book and they talked about being your own person and not succumbing to peer pressure. She was able to avoid any talk about hair or makeup or clothes, and felt that she planted one seed in a garden valuing girls’ brains and not girls’ looks.

I, for one, vote for planting more such seeds and growing that garden as large as possible.

Three cheers for smoothies!

August 21, 2012August 21, 2012Leave a comment

Maria attended her first cheer leading practice tonight. It made me cry. There she was trying so hard to follow the hand and feet movements, and surprisingly, not doing too bad. She didn’t seem too interested some of the time so I was interested in hearing her reaction to it afterwards.

She loved it. She liked having some other girls she knew on the team, too. She’s excited about wearing her uniform and cheering at games. So far she has picked two sports that I would have never dreamed of as a kid – horse back riding and cheerleading – but I am just glad that she has chosen something extra-curricular.

When we got home, she wanted to make a smoothie. My mom has been pounding the goodness of smoothies to me lately so I figured we’d give it a go. All we had were bananas and strawberry yogurt so I found a recipe on line that suited our needs (but substituted bananas for blueberries and Splenda for honey). It has a lot of sugar but at least it has some protein and nutrients, too!

Cheers to better nutrition and cheerleading (Aunt Julie will be proud)!

Girl bonding around diarrhea and poop

November 13, 2010Leave a comment

Maria and Anna dressed up for Halloween

Maria wanted a girl in her class to come over after school so badly on Monday. Maria had gone through a couple of rough spots with girls in her classroom and I was excited to see her wanting to invite a friend over. I had been talking to her about how important establishing friendships with girls was during school.

Mario was still hanging with his grandparents (and wanting nothing to do with his parents) so I thought Maggie could earn her share of money for the day by picking Maria and her friend up from school. Maggie took them to the park, walked them home, and let them play in Maria’s room. I got home around 5:30, and as soon as I walked through the door, Maria and Anna were dragging me upstairs.

“You gotta see my room mom!”

“Yeah, you have to see Maria’s room!”

I closed my eyes to the point of not being able to see most anything in front of me but open enough that I knew what room I was in when we arrived at our destination. Maria’s room was CLEAN! You could walk on the floor instead of on clothes; you could select a book from the bookcase versus the floor; you could see the sheets on her bed rather than fifty-five stuffed animals. Unfortunately, five minutes later the room was back to its natural state with Maria and Anna throwing animals at me, karate-chopping me, and jumping all over the room. They were HYPER, laughing hysterically at anything I said or did or anything the other one did. Both of them rolling around on the floor beggin’ me to tickle them: the simple pleasure of being goofy for a while; just what I needed after a crappy day at work.

We decided to head to Panera for dinner. I put the two of them in the stroller and began our walk up the street. I was excited to talk with them about school and friends and teachers and being a girl and dealing with boys – ya know, all the stuff that a mom wants to chat up with her daughter and her girlfriends (already wanting the scoop in kindergarten!).

Instead, the entire way was full of talk about diarrhea and poop.

The two of them played off of each other like a comedy team. I was reminded of an incident with my friend’s son a few years back. The subject of “poop” had come up between another girlfriend and I, which my friend’s son overheard, and he laughed harder than I had ever seen him laugh before at the word “poop.” My friend walked in the room and asked “Did you say something referring to poop?!” Shocked, I answered in the affirmative and she just shook her head smiling. There is something about excrement that is innately funny to kids – and obviously not just to male kids. Nearly the entire meal consisted of this lovely talk – even with me trying hard to steer it to another topic.

So much for my female bonding moment with the girls. I can only imagine the conversation with Mario and his friends in a couple of years. Nonetheless, when we returned home, the girls sat down at Maria’s table and drew pictures for one another. The pictures consisted of two girls holding hands and hearts around them. They both wrote each other’s names and their own names above each girl and handed their respective picture to the other. When I dropped Anna off to her mom, the girls hugged and Anna yelled “I love you Maria!” and Maria responded “Love You, Anna!” I was grateful to hear that from them and witness a friendship develop (even if it has to be around diarrhea and poop)!

"MOM!"

Adventures in the Life of a Working Mama

Tag: Girls