Yay! I'm not an embarrassment!

To 'bee' honest, Chris is currently excited about our theme Halloween.

            The back of the package of striped Halloween tights reads, “One size fits all.” I’m here to tell you this is not true. One size does not fit all – unless your all is a size 6.

            Nevertheless, I struggled and strained and mostly sweated trying to pull those lying tights on to ready myself for Chris’ school’s “Fall Spooktacular” the other night. And let me tell you, when you’re sweating, those tights have an even more remote chance of truly becoming ‘one size fits all’.

            I have to admit, I said a few bad words while trying to dress that night. Then I threw the stupid tights across the stupid room and yelled that I might as well just wear stupid regular clothes if I had to go to this stupid Halloween party.

            You would have thought I casually mentioned that I was going to blow up a small country. The outcry was immediate, and I have to say a little flattering.

            “Nooooooo!” Chris cried in horror. “You HAVE to wear your costume! I already told all my friends that you are the queen! They’ll think I’m a liar!”

            Yes, I was the Queen Bee for Halloween this year. Chris was my little honey bee and the two dogs were our little worker bees. Grandma kept us all in line as our beekeeper.

            But I digress.

Right now Chris is thrilled this photo is on my desk at work.

The point is that my child was incredibly upset at the thought that I might don regular, everyday, normal clothes in front of her peers. Get it? She was not upset that I was wearing a costume in public. She was upset that I might NOT wear a costume.

            Somehow I pictured this inevitable conversation about my wardrobe going in a completely different direction. So far, miraculously, Chris does not appear to be embarrassed by me and my sometimes unconventional clothing choices – like the animal print my brother swears covers nearly half my closet. Like most six-year-olds Chris proudly points out, “That’s my mom” to strangers from across a crowded room. Even the good-looking strangers she meets on days when I have big pimples and a bloated stomach.

            Almost on a daily basis she begs me to allow her to invite her friends over. Really! She doesn’t even cringe that I’m ‘so lame’ when I tell her friends they can help decorate cookies or when I try to snap pictures of them playing Barbies together.

She eagerly points out the family pictures of us all in Renaissance Festival gear instead of ushering them immediately to her room. She even tells her unsuspecting guests excitedly that said room was decorated in surprise for her and isn’t it sooooooo beautiful? Not that isn’t it soooooooo dumb and what were her parents thinking?

            Not long ago, I had to laugh as I discovered Britney Spears’ “Baby One More Time” on Chris’ Disney CD that she forces me to listen to in the car pretty much every time we leave the driveway. I turned up the stereo and sang along to all the words I remembered a friend singing back in our single days when we regularly did karaoke. I refrained from the dance moves ol’ Britney did in her ground-breaking video – partly because I didn’t have the proper space in the front seat of the car and partly because I’m not smooth enough to move that way anyway.

I am THIS cool right now. 

            But the point is, Chris didn’t beg me to turn down the stereo or try to shrink down in her car booster seat at the thought that neighboring drivers might catch a glimpse of me. And she didn’t think my uncool was showing either! I swear her voice was tinged with awe when she asked how I knew the words to that song and could I teach them to her.

            It’s amazing to me because I’m currently so old that I don’t recall the early days of my childhood when I might have actually been proud of my family. I only remember the days when I wished to sink directly into the floor when encountering a fellow family member and didn’t know most of my friends were equally ashamed of their own families.

Right now, Chris doesn’t seem to care that I’m not the youngest or thinnest mother on the block. Right now, she doesn’t seem bothered by our familial quirks and eccentricities that make us, uhhh, unique. Right now, Chris is so thrilled by visits from her cousin even that she told me it makes her shy and she has to hide behind my butt.  

I’m not naive enough to think this admiration of her extended family will continue forever. One day, we are going to wake up and Chris will sneer at my comfy jammies and roll her eyes in disgust at my annoying habit of decorating the downstairs bathroom in holiday themes. There will come a day when she will swear up and down to perfect strangers that she has no idea who that old lady is waving from her car as I call out to her and wipe away a tear of nostalgia for the old days when I was a goddess in her eyes.

In light of the crazy skeletons in our closet, I anticipate that Chris’ opinion of me is going to be changing very soon. I know this like I know that when she glimpses me during her dance recital she will scream ‘Mommy!’ and knock down three other children while running to hug me as if I’m Justin Bieber. Yeah, I’m that cool right now.

So for now, I will struggle with stupid Halloween tights because that’s what Chris wants and she is still thrilled that someone who loves her showed up to represent.

When the day comes that she no longer wants to admit I gave birth to her and that physically she can’t deny our lineage, I will still struggle to wear those stupid Halloween tights because that’s when it will become fun for me. I’m already planning my wardrobe for maximum embarrassment.

The day will come when you will wonder why I can't take a normal picture. Or BE normal.