Today I was at Justice doing some back-to-school shopping with my little Drama Queen. DQ was happily scanning the sales rack and running around with her catalog (complete with circles around the "cool stuff") to match up outfits while I tried to ignore the groans my wallet was making. Yes, I was proud of myself because I brought her on a day when I could use my "J Bucks", my 40% FB coupon, and it was tax-free week. But, I was also reminiscing about shopping with my mom when I was a kid.
Back in the day, say, oh, 3 decades ago, my mom would grudgingly take us to Kmart or Sears to stock up on school clothes. By "stock up" I mean we got a few things, were told to not to mess them up because we weren't getting any more, and growth spurts be damned--those clothes were expected to last us the whole school year.
I used to hate back to school shopping. I knew I wasn't going to get anything fancy. And, I knew if it wasn't from the clearance rack, it wasn't coming home with us. My parents were comfortable, but frugal, and they certainly passed those genes on to me. But, I do remember looking at the girls whose parents (or, more accurately, their moms) bought them pretty Shetland wool sweaters and pleated skirts and tights without knee-holes in them. I always wanted a pair of shiny Mary Janes.
So, I've found myself doing for my kids what I wished my parents had done for me. Yes, I fell face first into that lovely, psychologically traumatic rabbit hole of giving my kids what I wanted at their age. I don't know exactly why so many of us do this, but it seems like it's a universal experience. Instead of looking with all the blessings and gifts our parents and extended family/friends gave us as children, we look at the "lack".
For me, I had the most incredible childhood filled with experiences. We travelled. Sometimes near (family in upstate New York). Sometimes far (family in San Diego and Hawaii). Granted, our vacations were always to visit family (and, thus, save on motel bills), but travel we did. In a green Chevy Nova with plastic seats, dents that looked suspiciously of bullet holes, and an electrical problem whereas you couldn't use the windshield wipers and the lights at the same time. Which made driving on rainy nights VERY interesting. You also couldn't use the windshield wipers and the radio at the same time either, but since all my parents listened to was "my wife left me and my dog died" country music with the occasional classical station, us kids didn't really care if the radio worked at all. We learned a long time ago if we wanted to listen to Air Supply or Journey, we were going to have to go to a friends' house who had a "hip" dad and listened to such music.
But, the side effect of travel was there wasn't a whole lot of money left for things like clothes. Or, at least, cool clothes. No penny loafers with the penny in the slot. But I do vividly remember a particularly awful pair of burgundy and "gold" (Redskins colors. No, we did not watch football. But, SURPRISE, they were on sale.) fake suede sneakers. They were horrid. And, the wrong size. They began as at least a size too big ("to grow into") and ended up, many many months later, as so small my big toe was hanging out of a hole in the front. But, clothes and shoes--in my family, at least--lasted until summer. Then you could be blissfully barefoot for three glorious months. Old short jeans became cut-offs. Crappy clothes were the penance we paid for all the time we spent on family reunions, Disney World, Disney Land, Hollywood Studios (where I got to "meet" Jaws!), and Niagara Falls. My mom was always up for an "adventure", and she would pack us kids up at the butt-crack of dawn to stand in line for a new museum exhibit or the White House Easter Egg Roll. I've seen the King Tut exhibit, slept through more foreign films festivals than I could ever care to remember, and met such alluring celebrities as Punky Brewster and the kids from the early '80's Nickelodeon (ahhh, I had such a crush on Alistair...)
On the other hand, my kids have clothes from Gap, Hanna Anderssen, Gymboree, and now Justice. Yes, they are heavily discounted, but they are replaced when they get too small. Their shoes are from Stride Rite and/or Nordstrom (hey--I worked there. Old habits die hard.) They never get to the point where their toes grow through the fronts of their shoes. Usually.
But, their penance is that we don't really travel. They've never been to Disney Land or Disney World. Never seen an Easter Egg Roll at the White House (it's way too hard to do the whole "lotto" thing now. I was better with the lines.) Forget celebrities--unless you mean Cha Cha the clown at our community's summer party. Poor Wild Man has never even been in a plane. And, frankly, I think most of America should thank us for that.
And, when we do travel, we don't do it in a car with plastic seats and negligible seat belts. Our wipers work fine in sun and rain.
Which has me torn. I wish I could give my kids every thing I had, as well as everything I wanted. I wonder if they'll grow up and say "gee, I wish mom and dad worried a whole lot less about having a safe minivan, and spent the money on travelling in a 30 year old Chevy Nova to the Grand Canyon." Or, "I was never all that excited about having shoes that fit. I'd gone barefoot for a chance at a Disney cruise."
But, at the moment, my little 9 year old baby girl is thrilled to have t-shirts with logos and peace signs. The little dude doesn't care all that much about clothes yet, but he's in bliss with his collection of Tonka firetrucks and construction vehicles. (That's another thing my parents didn't believe in--toys. Or, at least, the "fad" toys. My Barbie Dream House came from cruising on garbage day. And. it. was. awesome.) And I'm stuck in the inevitable and unenviable position of every parent that has ever existed in the history of mankind--hoping I've made the right decisions (however small they may be) for the kiddos and hoping I haven't spoiled or deprived them too much in anything. Or everything.
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