By Anna Purrington Adams
The other day I was struck by the colors of the various pieces of clothing I was taking out of the dryer. In it were things such as a pair of bright pink sweatpants and a white fairy footed sleeper that belong to my infant daughter together with a bright green anklosaurus t-shirt and black slayer hoodie of my son’s. What I found most interesting about this was how obvious it would be to anyone, through only the colors of my laundry, to confirm the gender of my children. Dinosaur shirts = boy. Pink princess stuff = girl. But I never planned on it being that way for my kids, at least before they were actually born, anyway. Though my husband and I elected not to find out the sex of either baby in advance, I felt like whatever the gender of either child, we would do our part to raise our kids in a manner far away from your basic pink or blue stereotypes. If the baby was a boy, we would openly ban the purchase of camouflage, sports icons, or any sort of toy weaponry. Similarly, there would be no pink outfits, makeup kits, or Barbie dolls for a daughter either. These were the things enslavement to one’s gender would be made of, and I would have none of it. If my son wanted to play with dolls and pretend to nurse them (which he did), he could go for it. If my daughter chose to favor the red Matchbox Dodge Magnum over her tea set (which also happened), I would not stand in her way. There would be no rigid definitions of gender appropriate behavior in this house, including that of toys and clothes.
I don’t know when exactly I revised my views on all this, but I know that it happened, and with each child. For my son, it may have been a little green Old Navy romper outfit that displayed the tiniest little soccer ball in the upper corner next to the logo. It was adorable, it was on sale, and, well, soccer was a nice co-educational kind of sport, right? Strike one. The next item would not be so guiltless. My husband brought home a gopher football jersey for our little guy. Neither of us were what you would call athletes in school, and certainly would not be considered avid sports fans now in adulthood (although I could justify the shout-out this jersey was giving, second hand, to my alma mater), but something about seeing our round, bald, bruiser of an infant in a football jersey seemed.....right. Uh, definitely strike two. The sport-related clothing issue had been nullified, and along the way a few camouflage items made their way into his drawers, but soon I was pregnant again, and dammit, I was NOT going to cave on pink princess crap. No way. Of course, our second child was a daughter. Of course, EVERYTHING for baby girls is pink, and I was ready for this. I had prepared a lovely giraffe outfit of orange and yellow for the baby’s homecoming and plunked her into it over the vast assortment of new clothing people had brought as gifts. During the pregnancy I had insisted that were the baby a girl, no one bring anything pink within our grasp; no Disney, no dolls, no princesses, NADA. This ridiculous charade was continued for approximately two days after her birth. After that, I not only broke down and allowed pink dresses, and yes, Disney icons, but took an almost maniacal pleasure in buying these things for her myself. Just as sure as my son looked perfect in football jerseys, my daughter looked divine in red plaid Gap skirts with matching tights. The clearance sections at Target, Old Navy, and Nordstrom Rack became downright dangerous after a while, as I was completely defenseless against their latest “girlie” additions such as “Cute Bunny” cotton separates or a Polo logo-ed Ralph Lauren sun dress.
I ate my words. Every last one of them. And while I still plan to work hard at instilling a sense of both sensitivity and practicality in each of my children, I no longer take issue with what color they might be wearing as they learn about life. Or if a stray Tinkerbelle happens to find her way onto the wall of my daughter’s bedroom.
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