Someday, My Botox Will Come

As a child I loved the story of Sleeping Beauty. I knew all the words to the songs, and I loved the idea that my prince would one day ride into my life and I would live happily ever after.( Ironically, I did meet my husband while he was out riding, but I am not sure that riding scrub in a friend’s green Volkswagen Rabbit counts…)

I watched the movie recently with my little daughter. I was excited to show her something that I had loved so much as a child, but we didn’t even make it through the whole movie for three reasons.

1.      Stupid fairies. They valuedall the wrong things in life. Most specifically Flora and Fauna. If they would have granted Aurora the gifts of wisdom and strength instead of beauty and song, the princess would have been smart enough not to touch any spindles and strong enough to defeat the dragon/witch on her own. Instead, she spent 16 years running around the forest forming romantic attachments to owls and fine tuning her soprano. Dumb. Blonde. You really can’t blame her, I mean, she must have been a superbly ugly baby for Flora to take one look and give the gift of beauty as fast as she could. (As a side note, the original French folklore Aurora was brunette and wit was one of her gifts… thank you Disney for creating a blonder, dumber princess. Mattel will be eternally grateful, as well as trophy-wife seekers across the country. Can I also argue that Disney and plastic surgeons are in business together? Dang you Ariel, I can never wear a clamshell bikini without comparing myself to you…)

2.       My daughter is not waiting around for anyone to rescue her. Period. I don’t even want her to think that’s the way girls behave.  I know this is a societal value shift, as evidenced by more recent butt-kicking Disney heroines such as Rapunzel, but I don’t even want her getting the idea into her cute little head. Since her two older brothers are currently at her beck and call, I doubt her idea of gender roles will be in any way defined by a cartoon, but I don’t want to take any chances.

3.       Did I mention the two older brothers? “Boring. Ew. Let’s go outside and attack each other with ninja swords.” My little girl waddled after them and picked up her own sword, wreaking havoc in our yard and beating up her brothers. She is not yet two years old, but she can wield a plastic weapon a la Xena Warrior Princess, but that is a whole other topic…