Getting My Girl On, part I

99.9% of the time, I'm not only satisfied to be raising all boys but also very appreciative to be raising all boys. I never "got" the girl thing when I was a girl, and it wasn't until I was fully an adult before I even really enjoyed being much in the company of other females, other than a few, select friends, most of whom were not very girly. I had a really girly-girl friend in junior high for awhile, and I mightily tried to live up to her standards of girldom. In high school, off the top of my head, I can't think of too many girl-girl friends with whom I was close....one or two, but not many.

My mother wasn't overly girly.

I would try. And after a few weeks of getting up early to blow dry, apply a curling iron, don the make up, and coordinate the outfit, but eventually, sooner rather than later, I'd be minimizing all the hair work and make up and wearing tshirts and jeans if given the chance.

Not a lot has changed over the years, except that I focus even less on fashion and style.

I spent many an enjoyable afternoon when younger cruising the mall, but I can't say that shopping has been an important part of my life for the past 25 or so years. I go on search and destroy missions: I need X. I go in search of X. I rarely get Y or Z. I rarely just head out to shop for the sake of shopping and without certain items in mind.

My boyz, while clearly having ideas about what clothes are worthy of wearing and which are not, aren't overly interested in fashion. If the shirt has AE on it, they'll wear it. One wears plaid shorts; one won't. One wears long sleeves; one won't. They rarely shop for the sake of shopping.

Two buzz their own hair or have me buzz it. And when I say "buzz," I mean "buzz." One puts no attachment on the electric clippers, taking his hair as close to the scalp as possible. One gets his hair cut a few times a year and isn't too picky about style. He knows what he doesn't want more than what he wants.

Yet, we can be all over noise, movement, experiments, craziness. As one friend said in passing tonight, as I commented on the coolness factor of someone else's boy chomping on a "Pop-It" and having it explode in his mouth, "You are suited for having all these boys" (or something to that effect). Yep, I am. I'm thriving on it. I'm good with it.

I always feared having a girly-girl daughter. What if I just didn't get her? What if she wanted to do things that I have no desire to do? What if she wanted me to teach her about make up? What if she acted like I acted as a young woman? In general, I'm lazy, and girls just seem like so much work to me.

But I digress. In sum, in general, while I wouldn't have sold a girl child to the gypsies and would have loved her from the soles of my feet to the top of my hair, I don't regret not raising any girls. I'm quite content.

That said, I've enjoyed having girls come through my life, more so now that the girls are older. Actually, I enjoy the boys a lot more now that they are older, too. There's nothing like real conversation to make me appreciate a person, male or female.

I rather like it when the boys' female friends come over. I really enjoyed having a girl along on our recent Tennessee camping trip. She provided a slight change in energy from what I am used to. I enjoyed talking about things she and I share an interest in, books that we've both read--books that wouldn't have appealed to my boys at all.

And the first week of July, my niece, Sophie, will be here. For the past few years, she and I have taken part of a day and I've gotten my girl on. We shop; we go to lunch; we watch a chick flick. One time, we did our nails. When my other niece, now in her 30s, was young, I took her out to buy makeup. It's really nice to spend quality time with young women, especially now that I'm old enough for my wackiness to be forgiven (I hope).

It's fun to get my girl on like that. I wish Sophie lived closer, so I could do it more often. I wish that the one girl who's somewhat of a regular at the house weren't so busy these days. We'd planned to have a girl-night at one point, but her job and my family got in the way.

Hmmmm....what should I plan to do with Sophie this summer?