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Aug. 29th, 2004 11:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
which_chickI went over to La's today for their reunion/picnic thing. I'm not related, but they invited and I didn't have any other plans, so I went. In the course of the day's events, I wound up driving La and Ash school shopping. (La is my age. Ash is her sixteen year old son.) I carelessly commented that going school shopping for Ash was significantly less painful than it was going with my parents. I shouldn't have said that, because he asked me to explain.
Why was it painful to go school shopping with my parents? Because they wanted me to wear things I did not want to wear. We had differing ideas of what was appropriate and suitable. The phrase "You could be so pretty if..." came up more than a few times. There was no faster way to raise my blood pressure when I was in school than to say "You could be so pretty if..." to me. I am many, many things. Pretty isn't one of them. Neither is gullible. School shopping was basically a war where my parents tried to make me more of a "suitable" daughter. I resisted as much as I was able. None of us went home happy.
So, I explained this to Ash. And in his sixteen year old way, Ash asked why I didn't just steal my brothers' clothes. *sigh* I snapped at him fairly solidly, and he didn't really deserve that. He had no way of knowing that he'd just stepped on another landmine in the conversational minefield of my life. The simple truth is this: There is no amount of crisco, no force applied via shoehorn, that could squeeze me into the pants worn by my older brother Roy, either now or when I was in high school. I am roughly three inches taller and twenty pounds heavier than Roy and I have been that way for at least the last twenty years. My brother Joe, two years younger than I am, was also quite the little stick boy when we were both in high school and I would not have fit into his pants either.
Basically, the only clothes that I fit into were the ones that my parents (first my mother, and then after I hit ninth grade, pretty much my father and his wife) approved and purchased. My fucking ass was too fucking fat to fit into my brothers' clothes. I was fucking huge. I still am fucking huge. *sigh* So I snapped at Ash, who had innocently asked why, if I hated school shopping with my parents that damn much, I didn't just steal my brothers' clothes. Because I was too fucking fat, Ash. All right? I was too fucking fat. Then La snapped at me on the grounds that I had huge issues and was snapping unfairly. I probably do have huge issues. And a fat ass.
We stopped talking about school shopping after that.
Interestingly, while we were at the mall, I was quite pleased to note (in the boy's section) a rather harried mother with her teenaged (fourteen?) daughter wearing black and navy in tow. The mother asked the counter folk if she had to go "all the way back to the girls' section" to have her daughter try on the jeans (from the boy's section) that they'd picked out. I didn't say anything, but I was rooting for the teenager.
Now, before I get another email from my mother defending her behavior and clarifying her views, I have not had to go school shopping with EITHER parent since 1988. I'm pretty much not mad about it anymore and the remaining issues I have on this subject are my own damn fault. I do not wish to discuss this subject further in email. Mom. I'm not ATTACKING you. This is NOT ABOUT YOU.
Why was it painful to go school shopping with my parents? Because they wanted me to wear things I did not want to wear. We had differing ideas of what was appropriate and suitable. The phrase "You could be so pretty if..." came up more than a few times. There was no faster way to raise my blood pressure when I was in school than to say "You could be so pretty if..." to me. I am many, many things. Pretty isn't one of them. Neither is gullible. School shopping was basically a war where my parents tried to make me more of a "suitable" daughter. I resisted as much as I was able. None of us went home happy.
So, I explained this to Ash. And in his sixteen year old way, Ash asked why I didn't just steal my brothers' clothes. *sigh* I snapped at him fairly solidly, and he didn't really deserve that. He had no way of knowing that he'd just stepped on another landmine in the conversational minefield of my life. The simple truth is this: There is no amount of crisco, no force applied via shoehorn, that could squeeze me into the pants worn by my older brother Roy, either now or when I was in high school. I am roughly three inches taller and twenty pounds heavier than Roy and I have been that way for at least the last twenty years. My brother Joe, two years younger than I am, was also quite the little stick boy when we were both in high school and I would not have fit into his pants either.
Basically, the only clothes that I fit into were the ones that my parents (first my mother, and then after I hit ninth grade, pretty much my father and his wife) approved and purchased. My fucking ass was too fucking fat to fit into my brothers' clothes. I was fucking huge. I still am fucking huge. *sigh* So I snapped at Ash, who had innocently asked why, if I hated school shopping with my parents that damn much, I didn't just steal my brothers' clothes. Because I was too fucking fat, Ash. All right? I was too fucking fat. Then La snapped at me on the grounds that I had huge issues and was snapping unfairly. I probably do have huge issues. And a fat ass.
We stopped talking about school shopping after that.
Interestingly, while we were at the mall, I was quite pleased to note (in the boy's section) a rather harried mother with her teenaged (fourteen?) daughter wearing black and navy in tow. The mother asked the counter folk if she had to go "all the way back to the girls' section" to have her daughter try on the jeans (from the boy's section) that they'd picked out. I didn't say anything, but I was rooting for the teenager.
Now, before I get another email from my mother defending her behavior and clarifying her views, I have not had to go school shopping with EITHER parent since 1988. I'm pretty much not mad about it anymore and the remaining issues I have on this subject are my own damn fault. I do not wish to discuss this subject further in email. Mom. I'm not ATTACKING you. This is NOT ABOUT YOU.
