By Kris
My two sons like "boy stuff." Give them a doll, and they may hug it for a minute. They may even pretend it's sick and put it to bed. But always, they wind up playing kickball with it or hitting it in the face with chalk until it looks like the victim of a cult ritual. I don't try to understand, I just put the poor thing away.
Ben never liked dolls much, but he always loved feather boas. In one of his toddler books, a girl had a purple boa tossed around her neck. Again and again, he asked to see that page. "Is that a feather boa? Is it soft?"
I never bought him a boa, because I figured he'd find a way to hang himself with it. But now that he's 4 ½, I thought of it for Christmas. So as we looked through a toy catalog recently, I pointed one out.
"I hate boas," he said.
"You do?"
"Yeah. I hate boas! Boas are for girls."
"Who said that?"
"Megan."
"Oh."
This revelation is the latest in a pattern of girl aversion that began six months ago. One day this summer, after I talked to him about his new class, he asked, "Will it be all boys?"
"No, honey."
"Aaaw!"
Ben's favorite colors were always green and purple, but blue has edged out purple for one reason: pink and purple are "girl colors." And now, his schoolmate Megan has spoken to him about the gender appropriateness of feather boas.
The boa thing makes me kind of sad, and reminds me of a similar fate which befell my nephew Peter. Whenever I saw Peter as a young child, he had his nails painted green or black. No doubt a side effect of having three sisters, it became his signature and it looked cool.
But after his first day at kindergarten, he came home with a long face. When his mom came home, Peter summoned her to the bathroom and emerged with polish-free nails. The kids at school had made fun of him, and his polish-wearing days came to an abrupt end.
Out of curiousity, I left a Christmas gift for my niece sitting on the kitchen counter one day last week. The package contained a Barbie doll, a stove with pots and pans on it, a girl doll sitting on a stool, and packets of frosting. Even I wanted to play with it.
My 3-year old, John, saw it first. "Look at that doll," he said. "That's my doll." Then he burst into laughter at such a ridiculous thought and walked away.
Later, Ben came in. "Look. It's a girl thing."
"That's for your cousin Emma, for Christmas," I told him.
"I hope Santa doesn't bring me any girl stuff!" he huffed, and stomped out of the room.
I loved GI Joe and Transformers when I was young and always had dirt under my nails. Then I discovered the true meaning of boys and haven't walked out of the house without makeup since. Funny how kids are.
Posted by: Terri | December 27, 2004 at 04:38 PM