Useless crap

See, I told you I would be back to posting useless crap in no time.

I try really hard to instill into the girls that I come into contact with (my own daughter and the other Girl Scouts) that it is really important for them to grow up to be strong, capable women. Despite the fact that, you know, I'm insecure and a disaster, they really look up to me. They haven't been able to recognize a huge mess when they see it yet.

Last night we were working on a badge called, "Her Story". There are several parts to the badges and I try to do a few sections at each meeting, so the girls won't be overwhelmed.

The first thing we did was: MY TIME LINE.

I showed the girl's an example of a time line (from the book) and then showed them mine. It was a very simple concept. I wrote things such as:

THAT CHICK'S TIME LINE.

Age 37: Go to Hawaii

Why? I don't know. Not that Hawaii isn't lovely, but I have no burning desire to go there. I think I just felt I had to put SOMETHING because really? I have no idea what I want to do next week, much less six years from now.

Each girl worked on hers individually and then turned them in to me.

They were interesting, to say the least.

My own daughter:

Age 24: Adopt a child
Age 25: Get married to a man with a moustache

Another girl:

Age 10: Go to college
Age 18: Have a baby

And a third girl:

Age 18: Get a full-time job
Age 20: Support my mom

Yeah. Just...yeah.

So, we moved on to the next part of our activity. I explained what "issues" are (basically I said issues are something that people have strong opinions about...I didn't say, "That girl has ISSUES!" or anything. That would just be crass I think) and asked them to think about issues that women have to face today. I wrote on a piece of paper: What is the biggest issue facing women today? And then I asked them to "interview" five different women of all ages and see what their responses are.

One girl asked if she could say what SHE thought the biggest issue was. I told her, sure.

And she said: Praying.

They asked me, and I said, "Women who are left with children to raise and have to live in poverty."

And they wrote on their paper: Women who live in Peoria.

Yeah.

Just...yeah.

For the final part of our activity, we talked about fairy tales and how the world has changed. I asked them for some of their favorite fairy tales.

"Cinderella!"
"Winnie the Pooh!"
"Shrek!"
"BECAUSE OF WINN-DIXIE!"

Clearly, we were veering off track.

I said, "Okay, let's take Cinderella!"

I briefly reviewed the story of Cinderella. Girl lives with evil/wicked step-mother, everyone treats her like crap, she's the maid, she sneaks out and goes to the ball, meets the dude, he loves her, she loves him, she runs away, loses her glass slipper (as an aside, wouldn't glass slippers be like RIDICULOUS to walk in? What is UP with that?), he finds her, they get married, they live happily ever after, blah, blah, blah.

I said, "How would that story be different today?"

Hands wave wildly.

"There aren't any castles around here"! (That was from my own daughter. I'm so proud.)

"There aren't any dinosaurs!"

"Can I have some more popcorn?"

Sigh.

I then explained that women today can have their own jobs and their own careers and they don't have to sit around on their butts waiting for some dude to come rescue them. I might have said that Cinderella could have called DHS and reported her Step-mother for violating child labor laws. I don't know. I can't be expected to remember everything I say.

They looked at me and nodded their heads and then my daughter raised her hand and said, "But MOM! I want to get married!"

and another girl raised her hand and said, "You can live alone, but what if you break your leg! You need someone to drive you to the hospital."

Gloria Steinem? That chick has nothing on me. She never had to teach nine year old's how to be strong, independent women.