Pink is for Everyone

A friend mentioned today that my last couple of post have been "experimental." Hmmm... Well, there's no experimenting here today. Unless you count Keaton experimenting with lipstick.



Yep. I'm pretty sure I've let Keaton wear lipstick to school two days in a row.



My mind drifts back to the peaceful, quiet days of spring break. Keaton gets an allergy shot each week which is really no big deal to him, almost to the point where I worry about him having some terrible disease that causes him to not feel pain. His Mimi usually takes him, but during spring break I had the honors. As I sat there watching him roll up his sleeve and take it like a man, studying his face for even a tiny grimace indicating that he can, in fact, feel pain, I was again amazed at how grown up my baby can be.



After the shot he always gets to choose a prize from this fabulous drawer full of all the things kids love - bubbles, bracelets, slinkies, stickers, etc. So on this spring break day he rummaged through the drawer, deciding and changing his mind several times, until he finally chose the perfect prize - a tiny little tube of lipstick (the dress up kind).



Now, the fact that my three year old son chose lipstick is really less surprising than the fact that I let him keep it. I figured it probably didn't really work and that he'd probably lose it before we got to the car, so there was really no reason to make it an issue. And I was right.



Until yesterday morning. Keaton and I were driving to school, and he was singing songs partly in English but mostly in his new made-up language, and I turned to smile at my sweet, silly little boy. That's when I noticed the lipstick.



I don't know where or when or how, but he found it, and he was going to use it. Between the notes of his song he was lathering up his lips with that tiny pink tube, and they glistened in the bright morning sunlight.

Because I'm such a good mother, I realized that his dad would never know and it probably wasn't a big deal. It certainly wasn't a big enough deal to warrant the tremendous fight that would ensue if I forced that tiny tube from his determined three year old fingers. So I let him go on to school, lipstick and all.

The next morning, I turned to him in the back seat to see him not only lipstick-ing his lips, but also the pads of his fingers. "Look, Mom! My fingers are pink!" he said. That's when I decided to put my foot down.

Me: Keaton, did you know that's lipstick?

Keaton: No it isn't. It's chapstick.

Me: No. It's pink and has butterflies on the outside. It's lipstick and lipstick is for girls only.

Keaton: Pink is for everyone.

Me: Not that pink. It's for girls. It's make-up, and only girls wear make-up.

Keaton (matter-of-factly): You're wrong and I'm right. It's chapstick. It's for boys. And pink is for everyone.

And the conversation was over. He hopped out of the car with his pink lipstick and pink fingers, looking back at me as if he had taught me a thing or two on that short drive to school.

Now I've got to go find that lipstick and hide it in a place he can never find it. It's the only way to keep Trey from eventually killing me.