To the version of me who will become the mother of a daughter: Part 1

Infant
You will want to buy her pink baby clothes
And then you will want to buy her blue baby clothes because the pink guarantees less playtime focusing on fine motor skills
But why should you play into society's wants because you will raise a rebel, but even so your rebel needs fine motor skills, and around and around and around we go
Choose orange
You hate orange, you've hated orange since fourth grade
Dress her in orange
Let her become your orange
Let her become the sun
Kindergarten
When the boy's father won't step in because teasing means he likes her
Flood the playground with four year old girls
Let her lead her first rebellion, pull the stick out of her mouth and place it in her pudgy fist
First Grade
When she needs glasses and cries because only nerds have glasses
Buy a thick book on female inventors and read it between bath and bed
Swallow your pride, rip out your contacts, settle the lenses on your nose and wear them out of the house
Second Grade
When the english teacher pretends not to see her hand because she knows the answer, do not tell her to put it down
Believe me, she has tried putting it down
Pull her out of class, take her to the library, answer all of her questions, tell her to ask more
Third Grade
When she starts pinching her stomach, squishing her cheeks, spending hours crying over the american girl doll catalog
Asking you to buy low-fat icelanding yogurt, cookies made of bran flakes and child tears, carrots with polenta in them
Shatter the mirror
Throw out the scale, donate it to a food shelter, a highschool science department, somewhere other than your bathroom floor
Take her on a pizza tour of New York City, teach her how to make scones before the birds wake up in the morning
Pack notes in her nutella sandwiches and at the bottom of her tortellini
Fourth Grade
She stops talking, stops smiling, shuts herself in her room with a twisted series of books 5 years too mature and inanimate objects for company
Go in
Open the damn door
Remember how badly you wanted them to open the door
Explain therapy, take her to your therapist, find her a therapist, sit in the waiting room wishing you could break in but knowing you can't
Kiss her forehead, hold her hands, pick her up and don't put her down, never put her down
​Hold her in your arms forever
 

ZoeBee

VT

18 years old

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