Picture Day thoughts
Picture day at school can be a trial. For kids, it may be that they must be extra well-groomed and told not to play too hard before their photos are taken. This could mean extra time getting hair done, or lack of choice in what to wear that day. This morning my 8-year-old was watching me select his āspecial outfitā for picture day. I pulled out a comfy relatively nice t-shirt to get at a cute little collared button-up underneath it in our āclean laundryā laundry basket. Then I started looking for bottoms to wear. He took one look at the button-up and said āOh, please donāt make me wear that.ā I thought about it and I remembered the knock-down argument my mother and I had in my Junior year of high school when I wanted to wear dark makeup, a leather choker, and clothes she would never have picked out for me. I wanted to be comfortable and to look like myself; she wanted a perfect picture to remember an idealized version of me from. So instead of making him wear the button-up that was so cute I let him pick the t-shirt. (I didnāt compromise on the jeans though, if you were wondering. The blue in his shirt didnāt match the blues in his shorts and this mom needed to draw the line somewhere!) So now, when I get his ridiculously overpriced 8x10 photo I can have my memory be of who he is, and not who I want him to be or hope he will grow to become. Iām happy with our solution ā I feel it was a good compromise. He gets the comfortable t-shirt and to hold on to his identity the way he wants to present it, and I get to have a [hopefully] adorable photo of the little boy I love best in the world. At least, for the prices they charge for a photo it had better be adorable!
