The Gendering of the Young

[Nat]

My mom kinda dressed me butch. She's not super-girly and she didn't inflict supergirly things on me. When she was a little girl, she wanted to be an architect or an archeologist. She was interested in castles - how they were constructed and why. She built little houses for her dolls and then she was done playing with them.

I had a fascination with the barbie stuff. I loved my barbies - loved playing barbies with other girls. I also loved my troll dolls - they were great to play with. I think it was good to have flat-chested, pot-bellied, short, squat, wild-haired, by-no-means-pretty dolls to play with. I made them clothes, I took them outside with me and made homes out of twigs and leaves. I gave them whimsical names. I guess the trolls are what taught me that if you love something or someone enough, you find them beautiful.

I remember when I got to go next door and play with the neighbor boy. He had neat toys. They did things. Transformers, cars, the castle grayskull, games like mousetrap. I remember realizing that there was a difference there and that I didn't know how I ended up with only girl toys. I don't think it was my mom's choice though as much as it was the choice of gift-givers and hand-me-downers. My mom couldn't afford to buy me much.

I have always thought I would name my child a gender-neutral name, though the one I always wanted to name my kid has gotten very popular of late. I think that whatever the deconstructionalists would like to believe about gender, I think people are born with a certain sense of who they are. It may be influenced quite a lot from the external environment, but I think kids know what grates on them gender-wise as much as they know whether or not they like broccolli.

When I was a little kid - ever since I watched the movie Splash, I suppose - I mostly wanted to be a mermaid. To be wild, to have impossibly long hair, to breath under water, to live in the ocean and be magical. I may still want that. That bit of me that's a boy - I think he wants it too.

I have participated in the gendering of the young - at least so far as I've bought girl stuff for baby showers for girls. I don't think I'd do that now though. Kids are so unexpected in their preferences sometimes - it's neat to see without interfering too much. My mom had this whole peter rabbit thing going on with my babyhood - she really did try to avoid gendering me. It was the 70s and all. I still am surprised she doesn't consider herself to be a feminist.