Three Days

Three days.  That's how long Elsie had been at school the morning I picked the slim cardboard box out from the closet, dusted it off, and opened it up for Elsie, displaying a staggering prism of cray pas from my former life as a dabbler in art. 

The box of oil pastels didn't have the immediate desired effect.  I was hoping for instant big eyes and ear-to-ear grin.  Instead I got,

"No!  Not crayons.  Paint.  I want to paint!"

There was only a half an hour to spend on this particular art project, so I had vetoed the paint up front, and Elsie was not happy about it.

"These aren't crayons, honey.  They're oil pastels.  Look!"  I set a piece of black paper on the fiesta oil cloth that protects my nice dining room table and pulled a pastel firmly and smoothly across the page.  The color is vivid on the black, a trick that wax crayons can't match. 

The demonstration was satisfactory.  The offering was accepted.  After a quick warning about how we don't eat the art supplies -- who knows what heavy metals lurk in adult paints and pigments -- she dug in.

"Pink!"  She demanded.  We found one and she commenced her drawing (which she informed me was a fire).

"Here's a nice one!  I told her.  It's half way between yellow and orange.  Goldenrod.  I bet it will show up really well on the black."

"No.  Pink.  I only want the pink ones." 


Three days.  That's how long it took in a mainstream peer group for the pink monster to eat my daughter.  We picked out all eight shades of pink from the box, and she draws pink fires, pink circles, and pink parrot fish -- then, most unsettling of all, a blue Daddy. 

When clothing catalogs come in the mail, and Elsie and I look through together (a strange little ritual we started ages ago), I ask her, "Which shirt do you like?"  Her tastes used to line up fairly well with my own -- bright colors of all sorts, bold prints.  Now, she likes the pink shirt best.  And the pink skirt.  And the pink socks.  And the pink dress. 

Oh dear.


***

Let it be know that I love pink.  Especially vivid orange-toned pink like coral and salmon.  And I don't mind if Elsie's favorite color is pink.  I just want it to be HER favorite color, and not something she adopts to fit in, or because she thinks it's a requirement of being a girl.  These gender expectations may seem silly and benign, but that innocent little color gets strapped to all kinds of heavy mass marketing and troubling messages about femininity that I would rather leave at the door. 

Since Elsie's pink stage began last week, it has calmed down a little bit.  I was heartened to find my daughter covered in turquoise paint when she came home from school today.  There's hope for her yet.