Too Cool for School

Annemarie has become obsessed with her looks lately, and this is both difficult and amusing for me. I have given the speech many times that it is more important to be kind and respectful of others, and to be happy yourself, than it is to live up to impossible and ridiculous social standards, and while she rolls her eyes at me and tells me she knows, I still sense inside that she is very, very much interested in looking like impossible and ridiculous social standards.

I am only heartened by the fact that she is still lacking in enough self-consciousness that she will run through the backyard naked if the situation seems to call for it (which sometimes it does, you know), or that she will be perfectly content to present herself to the public having dressed herself up in a melange of scarves, plastic firefighter gear, and Mardi Gras beads. These are the moments that give me some sort of twisted hope.

But then there are those days when the "I wanna look like that" bug shines through, and this morning was one of those mornings. I had picked out a perfectly nice looking outfit for her, and she shunned it in favor of something similar but a touch more edgy; you see, for reasons that are beyond me, Annemarie now seeks to look like a rock star.

The way that Annemarie mimics rock-stardom is by wearing a headband and putting on a pair of too short jeans that are torn in the knee. This is fine, and if we can continue to be "rock stars" in that way while avoiding the drugs, then I'm happy with this definition of rock star :). So after dressing herself in an outfit that she deemed more appropriate, she remarked:

"I look like a rock star. Like a teenager or a colleger. Do you think anyone will know that I'm in Pre-K?"

No one. No one will ever know.