2002-07-24 - 7:59 p.m.
I look out the window just in time to see our neighbor, a young single father, standing by the car patiently waiting for his four year old daughter. Miranda is walking slowly around the car, careful not to stumble on her costume: today it's a full length lavender net and satin creation, complete with tierra. I don't know them very well but he seems like a nice dad, and he always lets her wear whatever suits her fantasy.
Today, just my glimpse of the two of them reminds me of a black and white snapshot, taken a long time ago, of me at that age, with my father and a car. He was washing his DeSoto, with a sponge and bucket, and I was standing there in my pink formal. By my Dad. Thinking I looked beautiful. He seems to be looking at me with something like pride, although I didn't know it at the time. It is still a few years before the tensions of our opposite personalities make our relationship more complicated. I hope Miranda has an easier time growing up.
I remember how it felt to be a little girl in a long dress, pretending to be a princess or a fairy, wanting more than anything to be beautiful and magical. It's kind of a sweet little memory, and yet it scares me to think how quickly that desire is raised in young girls. How important it can become. After so many years, I want to think that things are changing, and that young girls might be valued more for their talent and energy and intelligence than for their looks. But it seems as though expectations have been added, and none have been substracted.
I just found out that my thirteen year old niece took part in a "Junior Miss" contest. Even though her parents were not completely in favor of it, she wanted to do it badly enough to pay for it with her own money. This is the child who has been thoughtfully and lovingly brought up to minimize all of those influences. Her life is full of animals and sports and books and art.... and every kind of intellectually enriching experience that could be provided. And she wants to dress up in a formal and be judged. She wants to know if she is prettier than the other girls, or more desirable and somehow better. She's a pretty girl. But I hope that her dreams go far beyond where her looks will take her.
Our narrow standards of beauty hurt even those who seem to fit the mold. Because at some point even beautiful young girls are no longer so, and must find the resources to replace their unearned privilege with something real. And it may be harder for them than for those of us who had to do it sooner.
When I see Miranda playing on the sidewalk, I stop myself from telling her how pretty she looks. I won't be the adult who tells her she is being judged on her looks, so I find something else to say. And the fairy princess looks a bit disappointed.
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