Evolution

by Missy

I was one of those parents.

The ones that look at your grubby little kid and make assumptions. The ones that look at his snotty nose and see, well, snot…and germs.  The ones that wonder how you could possibly let him wear the super-hero underoos t-shirt with those dinosaur pajama bottoms into the store. In public! With no shoes! His socks don’t match and there’s a hole in the left one!

It never would have occurred to me that maybe your child is dressed in those clothes because he picked them out. And they make him happy. And it’s okay. It’s not neglectful.

In my defense, many of my assumptions were rooted in honest observation. I’ve seen too many unhappy families stumbling through those giant discount stores, too many children wiping their noses on already filthy sleeves, begging for attention or just screaming out of exhaustion, and too many moms snarling at their tiny children to “shut the hell up”.  I definitely had a base for my visual stereotype.

My daughter, my first child, made it so easy.

I loved shopping for her. Everything matched. Always. She had shoes for every color scheme. Socks. Hair ribbons.

I allowed myself to look like crap on occasion but never my child.

If she spilled something on her clothes, they were changed immediately. Fortunately, I had a babysitter who not only agreed with, but, indeed, nurtured this lunacy. My daughter might have gone through as many as four outfits in one day, but I never picked her up in dirty—or unmatched—clothing.

Somehow, despite seasonal allergies, she never had a snotty nose.

She was the cleanest baby I’ve ever seen.

When we had our first boy, it went much the same for the first two years.

He, too, never left the house in unmatched clothes. I think I cut down on the number of shoes, but things were a little tighter financially.

It was okay for me to go out in a stained t-shirt, but, I figured, no one was looking at me anyway.  And getting myself ready took time away from my babies. Make-up became superfluous. My hair went for six, seven, eight months without styling and my short, sleek cut grew into a shaggy mass. Friends began to make cautious references to my appearance and then, when I didn’t make any obvious efforts to change, their comments became less guarded. By the time my third child was born, I had stopped working and they gave up. I was an official frump.

But my kids? Gorgeous.

Always.

Except…they began to make mud pies. And mud stew. And sometimes just mud, for no good reason. The mud got on their clothes and in their hair and I never stopped them because they were happy. Sometimes (shhh—don’t tell my mother-in-law) I’d have to hurry them to the store in a dirty shirt.

I started, too, hanging with a different group of moms. Ones who didn’t leave their kids at day care a little longer so they could get their hair done. Or their nails. Ones who, in fact, didn’t have a day care.

These moms didn’t mention my shapeless sweats. Many of them wore shapeless sweats. Or jeans. Few wore make-up. And all were completely entranced with their children.

When one toddler’s face was completely covered with strawberry juice, the other mothers just laughed. He giggled with them, delighting in the moment, his cheeks grubby and sticky and beautiful.

Another mother grabbed her grimy little one and tickled him, laughing about how many different kinds of dirt could be found on his shirt. And then sent him right back to the sandbox.

These mothers watch their children, making so many decisions based on an inward happiness rather than a superficial societal expectation of outer beauty and precision.  They hear their children’s heart and this inner joy radiates and becomes its own beauty.

I’ve learned that a child’s joy is simpler than convention suggests. Good parenting has far fewer rules and parameters than I was led to believe. Some of the most emotionally neglected children have closets filled with beautiful clothes and they have very clean faces because they haven’t been allowed to discover the pleasure of dirt. They live within the expectations of an adult world where sticky hands are a sign of negligence, not exploration, and unmatched clothes indicate indifference, not creative autonomy (or comfort).

In the end, nobody can judge my parenting but my own children. Their memories will record my rightful place in history and I’m hoping my earlier obsession with cleanliness is largely forgotten. I’d like to think they remember sand castles and mud pies, an unrestrained joy, an unchecked venture.

Missy's homeschooling journey began when she realized that the walls surrounding her daughter's classroom were too narrow; there was no room for exploration, no space for stretching. Now, she and her three children stretch and explore the world together. My blog: caffeinatedjive.

Comments

[Cristina]

Still laughing! I have three and at this point I insist that my youngest change her clothes at least every other day!
Peace and Laughter,

[Muddy Mama]

I loved this post! I have a few of those little skicky faced children in my own home, and am loving every minute of it. There is a reason my own blog is titled Muddy Bathwater!

[Crimson Wife]

When my oldest was little, I always matched my outfit to hers. Now that I've got 2, it's all I can do to have each person's outfit match itself. I have this feeling as our family gets larger even that will go out the window! When I was growing up, it always drove me nuts that my mom would let my youngest brother go out in public wearing 1 red boot and 1 green but now I have way more sympathy for her :-)

[eclecticeducation]

lol!!! Thank you for this post! I was a little neurotic about my first son, ok, maybe a lot neurotic. I was a divorced mom and I thought people would judge me by how my child looked. I also ran a daycare out of my home, mostly toddler girls and I even went and bought them each a brush for my house and hair do- dads for if they lost theirs during the day. I always cleaned them up the best I could and restyled their hair before their mom picked them up. Then my little boy turned 3!!!! Boys at 3 ATTRACT DIRT!!! There is no getting around it. I finally had to lighten up or go crazy. I chose to lighten up!!! :)

[Linda]

ROFL! My evolution in my 20+ years of parenting has been monumental. I had a baby 16 years after my first....that, more than ANYTHING, revealed to me just how far I had come!! Thanks for a GREAT post!

[Renae]

When I would see babies in only diapers, I would think, "Why doesn't that kid have clothes on?"

Now I understand. She did have clothes on. In fact, her mother dressed her in a cute outfit and even fixed her hair. That was twenty minutes ago before the dress-up drawer was raided.

[Melissa]

This is an excellent post! And so well said!

[Andrea]

Those were the days... I actually dressed my kids according to who we were going to run into that day. I wanted people who had purchased my kids clothes to see my kids in those clothes. Now if the clothes fit we're good.

[Rob at Kintropy]

Thanks for sharing your story & your transition-in-thinking. My wife and I embraced entropy early, but I think everyone starts out at the sweat-all-the-small-stuff level. Then the kids turn out to be *our* teachers, and they do a pretty good job shaking some of our assumptions loose.

[Summer]

LOL I was grinning along because I was one of those moms. My child was clean, matching, and snot free. Now I have two boys, I'm lucky to have them dressed at all anymore. LOL