Chicken Little was born glamorous. Once she was old enough to make fashion decisions on her own, her yen for style emerged. Little never met a frilly bit of clothing, hair accessory, or mirror she didn’t like. Lately, the kid has demonstrated a real affection for makeup.
Since she began school last fall, I noticed Little spend just a little extra time in the bathroom each morning. One day, long after I figured she’d finished tooth brushing and when it was high time to get the heck out the front door, I poked my head in the bathroom to see what she was up to. She was methodically replacing her fingernail polish, one nail at a time, in alternating colors, to match her outfit.
This quickly became a regular morning affair.
Soon after, Little discovered my own (albeit limited) supply of cosmetics. Immediately, it became unthinkable that she walk to the bus stop without first applying lip gloss.
This new habit led to some strange moments, like me doing a double take one morning as I buckled my five-year-old into her five-point-harness car seat. “Are you wearing mascara?”
“Um hmm,” she replied casually.
I love how consistently surprising parenthood is. First of all, these children came out completely who they are, totally irrelevant of Captain Daddy or me or whatever is in the neighborhood drinking water.
Second, decisions one is unwaveringly certain one will make in the theoretical future (of course I will not allow my child to wear makeup to Kindergarten. Duh.) get easily tossed out the window in the actual present, with no regret.
Turns out, I don’t really care if Little wears lip gloss to school. I care about other things a lot more, like her learning and being happy and staying safe and leaping off the school bus all smiles to give me a massive hug—a moment which is unquestionably the best part of my day, even when she leaves a lipstick kiss on my cheek.
Apparently Santa Claus agrees. He brought Little glitter blusher, a Hello Kitty hairbrush, and no less than eight different shades and flavors of lip gloss.
My kind of guy.
