long hair

Eleana is hard to contain sometimes…and she's at that age where she's likely to say things to other people that may offend someone. Not on purpose, and usually I've been lucky enough that the people she's talking to are really understanding of her words. At the Montessori school they discuss culture, and there are many children from other cultures in her classroom. Some are Indian and some are Asian and I think a couple are Swedish. It's a wonderful classroom, and Eleana loves all her friends. She is still in a color phase, where she's pointing out colors and telling me that yellow and blue make green and so on. She observes these things often, and as a result she calls her Indian and African friends in school brown. She means it lovingly of course, and falls in love so easily with other children.

My neighbor has many many grandchildren who are often over to visit. Eleana went for the first time to play at their house with their youngest grandchildren about a week ago and had a blast. As she was coming home she told me that the youngest girl was her new friend, and she was beautiful and had pretty brown skin. Of course there's nothing wrong with that, and I make sure she tells her friends these compliments too. It's the sweetest thing to overhear two small girls complementing each other on their pretty clothes, or pretty hair, or pretty skin. Girls need that in their lives, gentle loving encouragement. I hope as Eleana grows older and becomes a young woman she remains the same, complementing her friends as opposed to giving criticism or judging as so often young girls are prone to doing in their teens. I know if myself and my friends complemented each other a little more as teens I would have felt a little less awkward in my day-to-day life. Often I think we're too shy to say such things, or maybe are afraid to risk sounding too affectionate. But I love my friends now, and try to complement them as often as I can…and I hope Eleana does this as she grows up.

As I was saying, she's very observant lately. The other day at Target we were at the check-out where the clerk was a tall young man with long hair, tied in a pony tail at the base of his neck. His pony tail was long, too, at least hanging 10 inches from his neck. He greeted us and asked how we were, and had a fairly deep voice. Eleana looked a little surprised, squished her face up as if thinking and asked the question of all questions: "Are you a boy?!" with a strong emphasis on the word "boy."

Oh boy.

The clerk, thankfully, was lighthearted and told her yes he is a boy. She then said to him, "You have really long hair!" He said, "yes I do," and laughed. I apologized, and of course Eleana had no idea that she may have offended someone with a comment like that, and continued with "It's really long and pretty! SO handsome!" The clerk again was so gracious, and just said thank you and assured me it was no problem at all.

I was a little embarrassed, but the whole thing made me feel relief and I found myself smiling as we left the store. Eleana got a lesson in gender identification that day, and hopefully she will not be confused by it, but more understanding about those who make choices in spite of popular belief or traditions.