Oh, for the good old days

This afternoon had me wishing  for the days when propriety and manners were cultivated, rather than shunned in a headlong rush to tell the world of every passing emotion.  Nowadays merely having an opinion is all the reason anyone needs for sharing it.

Oh for a well-trained, well-mannered youth.

My six year old son and eight year old daughter had been playing outside when my daughter burst through the door dripping with dears and choking on sobs.  Something special to her had been ridiculed ("That's stupid!") and then she had been snubbed ("We're playing and it's none of your business!" followed by running away from her whenever she got close.)

We talked through the situation, I held her close and then she got on with her life.  Good girl.  She mentioned that her brother had been crying in the carport too.  A while later, I pulled him aside and asked what he had been crying about.

"I saw how mean they were being to Hannah," he said, tears welling up again.  "I wanted to protect her, but I was too late."

I wrapped my arms around that boy and hugged him till I thought his ears might pop off.

Chivalry is not dead.  The heart of a knight warrior (albeit a six year old knight warrior) beats in the heart of that boy.  His sister had been in distress and he wanted to be on hand to place himself between her and the dragons (albeit an 8 and a 9 year old dragon, but sometimes those are the worst kind.)

While I am exceedingly, exceptionally, extraordinarily fond of pants and voting and equal employment opportunities, I can see the beauty of bygone days.  Carefully cultivated words, elevated thoughts, dignity, duty, propriety and perhaps even kindness are fast becoming casualties in this fast paced world.

That's it.  I am having a cup of tea.  I may even indulge in some high-toned verbiage.  I may even put napkins on the table tonight.

In this way I shall "take arms agains this sea of troubles, and by opposing end them."  Okay, a cup of tea won't solve all of society's woes, but I did just quote Hamlet, and that has to count for high-toned verbiage.

The Be in Beautiful

I teach ballet to adorable four, five and six year olds and every single one of them has moments when they feel beautiful.  They all get the same look in their eyes, tuck their chin in the same way and adopt stylized princess-like movements.

I only see them for an hour a week and  I see every one of them feel beautiful.

But it's more than that.  They don't just feel like they look beautiful, they feel like they are beautiful.

When little girls play, they don't just pretend to look like Cinderella, they want to be Cinderella.

As adults we have a serious disconnect.

There are very few people we would actually like to be and the proliferation of self-help books and gyms and therapists says that just being us isn't cutting it.  But back to the first part of that sentence - there are very few people we would like to look like AND act like AND live like AND have families like AND get paid like AND have faith like.  Where do we look when we want to be like someone and not just want to be like a small part of them.  Is it possible that we already are the person we most want to be like?  Now I am all for aspiring.  Excellence is my favorite food and becoming the best person we can be is the whole point of being here.  But I am discovering more and more that wanting a bit of the person over here and a piece of person on that magazine over there just makes me depressed.  I look chubby and peevish when I get depressed.

I want to be okay just wanting to be me.  I want to feel great about being me.  Okay, I already do to an extent, but I want to love being me so much I don't want to be those parts of other people anymore.  Those examples can inspire ME to be a better ME.

Sidebar:
By now, the insensitive comments of Mike Jeffries (CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch) are old news.  So they only want to sell to their target market (women sizes XXS to L and men up to XXL).  Fine.  No problems.  Everyone is entitled to a target market, but once they start trying to attach their exclusive version of beautiful to an exclusive version of "be" and then publicly defend that version by denigrating nonconformists then they have crossed a line.

If one were to listen to them (before, after or through their carefully worded apologies) one would hear the message that beautiful has a size.  That "cool" can be bought and put on and that popular is worth the price tag.  You would hear that "All-American" is found in blonde hair and perfect, if unclothed abs.  (Seriously, why do clothiers use so much nudity . . . it seems counterintuitive.)

More damagingly you would hear the message that you are not okay.  You don't quite measure up.  You have to strive for that kind of worth and valuation and nothing inside you can mitigate your deficiencies but they have some denim that just might help.

They are trying to sell a "be" and make us believe it is beautiful and it is not.

End Sidebar.

I am ready to experience the "be" in beautiful.  In any given hour I want to feel what my dancers feel, that I AM a princess that I AM the fabulous I see in the world.

Alright, this essay needs polishing.  Rather than tighten it up, I am going to help my amazing honey make dinner for four ravenous children - two of whom smell like chickens, but that is a story for another day.

Have a BEautiful one!