Back in Blue Jeans

If you don't stop fidgeting, my grandmother muttered through a mouthful of pins, new dress or not I'm gonna tan your hide.

It was the week before Easter and she was annoyed and cranky that we had been unable to find a what she thought to be a suitable dress. The selection at Robert Hall had been less than satisfactory and we had moved on to Filene's and Jordan Marsh, all without success. Reduced to having update last year's dress was making her short tempered - she had cut the sleeves, remade the collar, added a Pepto Bismol pink sash and was now adjusting the hem. I hated the sash with a passion, in truth hated all things frilly and girly, particularly the new patent leather shiny black Mary Janes and the lacy white anklets. Hold still! she snapped at me and gave the hem a final tug before finally setting me free.

I was, according to my mother, an unruly and ungrateful child, an unapologetic tomboy with a liking for dirt and a gift for talking back, a hopelessly un-girly little girl with no interest in dolls or dressing up. I hated having my hair curled and being forced into dance class, preferred fishing and frog catching over learning to bake. I didn't want to go shopping or try on make up or learn to play the piano, not when there were baseball games to play and hooks to bait, stones to skip and trees to climb. Being a girl left me cold and the prospect of womanhood was too silly to be taken seriously.

Easter Sunday came and we sat in a neat row in the crowded church, still as statues, washed, pressed and ironed with clean faces and not daring so much as a whisper. The service was long, the sermon interminable, the air hot and stuffy. Not many years later I would stand in the warm water of baptism and accept Jesus Christ as my personal savior before being thoroughly dunked under, a decision that had not been mine and which I barely understood at the time. My sneakers had been traded in for black pumps and a matching purse and it was a very long time before I came across that boyish little girl again. I happened upon her after my second divorce and a fling or three - having come to living happily alone, back in blue jeans, non-church going and a little crotchety - one morning she looked back at me from the mirror and winked.

Life is cycles and circles and finding contentment in your own self.