all girl

Today in my 'Images of God' class, we talked a bit about gender socialization and discussed in small groups our personal responses to a journal prompt on this topic. When it was my turn to read, I shared about my upbringing and how I was pretty much all girl, all the time. I told my classmates about the hand-crafted dresses that my mother made for my sister and me, complete with a matching bow for everyday of the week. I loved dolls and always colored with a pink crayon, I said. I made the transition into how these behaviors have shaped the woman that I am today. I laughed as I pointed out the headband I had on:

And then my classmate pointed to my notebook lying open on the table.

Yep, pink pen. Still the little princess who likes to play dress-up I guess.

There are so many more things I could say about this subject (including whether or not it's now a good thing that I like to play princess and how systematic theology may betray more patriarchal biases than one might immediately notice), but for now, the pile of homework beckons (as it has for the past several weeks--sorry that the blog has been one thing to cut out!) I will share one more quick story though. During our discussion, I was reminded of the little boy in my preschool class last year who loved to play dress-up and wear the sparkly blue Cinderella dress. He absolutely came alive when he put on that outfit (not that he wasn't a lively boy without it!) and went straight for it every morning. But my co-teacher finally got to the point where she was uncomfortable enough with it that she hid that dress and we had to dig out the army hat and the doctor's scrubs for him to play in from then on out. She was afraid his dad would catch him in it when he came to pick him up, or that the other moms would see, or that our director would walk into the classroom. How sad that this poor three-year-old couldn't play in a way that made him happy because of the gender roles we all have been assigned from birth. Interesting to ponder what it is that shapes us (and subsequently our understandings of God).