Saturday, December 09, 2006
Barbies Dream Home
When I was growing up my father was determined to make "a man" out of me. I have no idea what the hell that means, but indeed he was determined to do this.
This included things like being aggressive about how my hair was cut, the type of clothes that I wore (manly colours only - which sucks because honestly there are so many colours that waver on the verge of manly but are just in touch enough with their emotions to be considered kind of girlie that I wanted to wear but was not allowed) this inclduded navy blue, black, red (and how is that not gay?), and well anything that was muted and not in the gap baby collection for girls. As I aged it also included attempts to monitor what I watched, listened to, and read. But honestly, Daddy dearest was not cunning enough or even bright enough to stop me from doing what I wanted.
This has ended up in he and I arguing a lot. And in these arguments he always brings up an episode from Christmas when I was six years old. This Christmas was the one time that he actually did something himself (or so he says, I am sure he just made my mother go and buy it; but as it was his idea therefore he takes all the credit. It does not matter that my mother did all the execution of the work, as it was his "brain child" then therefore it was all his work. Which I find both arrogant and typically patrichal and ultimatly fucking annoying.
The root of this argument from that one Christmas was how he got me a mechano set that I would not play with. Not lets clarify a few things here: 1) I was not a rough and tumble boy. I was in fact a very girlie boy. I wore nail polish, I cross dressed sometimes, I had tea parties with my sisters, I got overly excited about ice cream with sprinkles and I played with Barbie. 2. If he had at all been paying attention to me and my interests he should have realized that a mechano set was really for him and not for me - did he really think I was gonna put down Barbie and her myriad fashions to pick up a miniature hammer and screw driver? I mean what the fuck? 3) My mother always went along with what he wanted but then she would also give into the things that I wanted. I bet that made things difficult but also very entertaining for her.
My father being the manly man he was (you know the type: wears plaid, goes hunting on the hunting seasons, gets angry about Quebec and the whole "french" thing to the point that he won't say french words that have been adopted into the english language - so therefore Cafes are actually Caves. I dunno - go fig!) was furious that I ignored his mechano set to the point that he would try to force me to play with it.
I did not want to play with it. Barbie was way cooler. I am not sorry about this, she was, or it was, or however you choose to represent Barbie (now that I am older I see that she is a horrible toy - but at that age she was super fun for me) But my father was relentless. My Barbies were taken away, Mom was yelled at, I cried, Barbies were returned.
So finally I acquiesed to my fathers lame ass requests and I made Barbie a home out of the mechano set. And then I refused to touch it ever again. That poory constructed home sat in the living room for weeks. My father silently fuming over the insult that I had betrayed his gift that was to make me more manly by using it to make something inherently girlie. And in all honestly I was not at all mechanically inclined. My Barbie home look poor. It did not look like any of the ones you could get in the store or the sears catalogue and was therefore substandard in my eyes.
But it finally shut my father up and led to other great fights that he and I had about my interests and my identity.
So readers do your child a favour this Christmas and do not get them a toy that you think will influence their personality and interests to some strange notion you have of what it should be. That is just fucking rude. Embrace who your child is and get them a gift that they will actually like. Because if you do not then your child will grow to hate you and end up in therapy and you really can not brag about that to your friends ... now can you?
This included things like being aggressive about how my hair was cut, the type of clothes that I wore (manly colours only - which sucks because honestly there are so many colours that waver on the verge of manly but are just in touch enough with their emotions to be considered kind of girlie that I wanted to wear but was not allowed) this inclduded navy blue, black, red (and how is that not gay?), and well anything that was muted and not in the gap baby collection for girls. As I aged it also included attempts to monitor what I watched, listened to, and read. But honestly, Daddy dearest was not cunning enough or even bright enough to stop me from doing what I wanted.
This has ended up in he and I arguing a lot. And in these arguments he always brings up an episode from Christmas when I was six years old. This Christmas was the one time that he actually did something himself (or so he says, I am sure he just made my mother go and buy it; but as it was his idea therefore he takes all the credit. It does not matter that my mother did all the execution of the work, as it was his "brain child" then therefore it was all his work. Which I find both arrogant and typically patrichal and ultimatly fucking annoying.
The root of this argument from that one Christmas was how he got me a mechano set that I would not play with. Not lets clarify a few things here: 1) I was not a rough and tumble boy. I was in fact a very girlie boy. I wore nail polish, I cross dressed sometimes, I had tea parties with my sisters, I got overly excited about ice cream with sprinkles and I played with Barbie. 2. If he had at all been paying attention to me and my interests he should have realized that a mechano set was really for him and not for me - did he really think I was gonna put down Barbie and her myriad fashions to pick up a miniature hammer and screw driver? I mean what the fuck? 3) My mother always went along with what he wanted but then she would also give into the things that I wanted. I bet that made things difficult but also very entertaining for her.
My father being the manly man he was (you know the type: wears plaid, goes hunting on the hunting seasons, gets angry about Quebec and the whole "french" thing to the point that he won't say french words that have been adopted into the english language - so therefore Cafes are actually Caves. I dunno - go fig!) was furious that I ignored his mechano set to the point that he would try to force me to play with it.
I did not want to play with it. Barbie was way cooler. I am not sorry about this, she was, or it was, or however you choose to represent Barbie (now that I am older I see that she is a horrible toy - but at that age she was super fun for me) But my father was relentless. My Barbies were taken away, Mom was yelled at, I cried, Barbies were returned.
So finally I acquiesed to my fathers lame ass requests and I made Barbie a home out of the mechano set. And then I refused to touch it ever again. That poory constructed home sat in the living room for weeks. My father silently fuming over the insult that I had betrayed his gift that was to make me more manly by using it to make something inherently girlie. And in all honestly I was not at all mechanically inclined. My Barbie home look poor. It did not look like any of the ones you could get in the store or the sears catalogue and was therefore substandard in my eyes.
But it finally shut my father up and led to other great fights that he and I had about my interests and my identity.
So readers do your child a favour this Christmas and do not get them a toy that you think will influence their personality and interests to some strange notion you have of what it should be. That is just fucking rude. Embrace who your child is and get them a gift that they will actually like. Because if you do not then your child will grow to hate you and end up in therapy and you really can not brag about that to your friends ... now can you?
# posted by No one asked us @ 6:39 AM 
