Pink or Brown?
So, on Saturday, we went to the bakery and Elsie got to pick out desserts for Camille and Ginger and Lee. She chose adorable mini-cupcakes for her BFF and then set about choosing cupcake toppers.
For weeks now, Elsie has been into choices between two things. And I have been giving her choices between two things--a transparent parental ploy giving her the illusion of control or power: as the magazines say, you don't ask a two year old if she wants to put on her shoes. You must say: "do you want to wear your rainbow shoes or your cowboy boots?" Elsie easily sees through this and assertively declares "no shoes, please." But clearly, she understands the value of options because she has been constantly asking us if we want "pink or brown?" At a tea party, we must choose between "pink or brown" even though the cups are blue and purple. She asks us if we want a pink or brown grape even though the two we are choosing from are both green. And sometimes she just gets up in our faces and demands "pink or brown?" David and I are so dazed lately that we just answer the question as if it needs answering, but we may have gotten some insight at the bakery the other day.
Elsie chose a pink kitsch-y cupcake topper for Camille--a red headed ballerina in a pink dress--and then this cupcake topper, pictured here, for herself. So is this what Elsie's insistent question really is about? In the tradition of "all I ever learned, I learned in kindergarten" and alluding to the profundity of children, is "pink or brown?" a commentary on race?
We still don't know the answer to "pink or brown?"--we may have to get some more cupcakes to figure it out.
