Shaving Our Legs

My 4 year old asked me today if she could shave her legs. Did I mention that she is 4? Why is it we spend so much of our youth wishing to be older? I looked at her and pondered that question. Why would she want to shave her legs? She doesn’t know that the three inch scar above my left ankle is from shaving. And that was from just last month. Wouldn’t she rather spend those minutes running outside barefoot without worry of messing up her pedicure or getting a callus on her foot? Without fear of tripping on a stone. Playing hide and go seek with her friends. Double dog daring each other to eat worms or to touch the dead mouse on the sidewalk? Dressing up and playing tea party with her stuffed animals. Shouldn’t she want to be drawing pictures on the sidewalk with chalk?

I mean really, I can’t recall a time when I didn’t have to shave my legs, and don’t get me started on lip and brow waxing. You don’t have to have hot wax poured on your face and ripped off with a strip of cloth when you are 4.

We spend so much of our childhood days longing for the responsibility of driving cars, putting on makeup, and yes even shaving our legs. Dreaming of being a grown up. But why? What is so exciting about being a grown up? I suppose there is a certain free feeling of doing whatever we want, whenever we want to do it. Of course that has it’s repercussions as well. We could drive 70 in a 45 zone, but if we do no amount of eye batting or flirting will get you out of a ticket, uh, or so I’m told. Windowed envelopes with the words Balance Duepeeking through are what saturate our mail boxes as grown ups. Mortgages, car payments, house repairs, worn out furniture, having more month at the end of the money, those are the things that replace running through the sprinkler on a hot and steamy August day when you grow up.

She will have to face all these adult responsibilities soon enough. The time she has now is precious and fleeting quickly. Childhood is a time for being able to be footloose and carefree. I’m still not going to let her shave her legs, but I am going outside to teach her how to catch fireflies.