Do You Believe in Fairy Tales?
I saw “Ever After” on TV tonight for the first time ever. It’s quite a nice film. Drew Barrymore did a lovely twist on the classic Cinderella story, making the heroine more of a strong character than a victim. It’s still, however, a fairy tale.
Katie is just now getting into the idea of princesses. Whenever she puts a dress on, she twirls and yells, “Look Mommy, I’m a princess!” To which I often reply, “Yes, sweetie, you are. You’re always a princess.” She even wanted to be a princess for Halloween. A quick trip to the fabric store changed that to a fairy. I couldn’t handle the complete princess bit.
I don’t know why her fascination with princesses bothers me quite so much. I believed in princesses when I was younger. I named all of my dolls proper “royalty” names like Victoria and Elizabeth. I remember getting up at the crack of dawn to watch Princess Diana’s wedding - I adored the pomp and circumstances and the Cinderella feeling that a commoner could marry a prince. Okay, sure, she wasn’t really a commoner, but you get my point…
I keep telling myself that it’s because I don’t like the stereotypical Disney princess version of fairy tales… You know, the ones with no mothers, and helpless young women who rely solely on their beauty and their goodness for both survival and accomplishment.
But after tonight, watching the movie, I don’t know if that’s really what’s bugging me.
Maybe it’s just that I don’t want her to grow up with unrealistic expectations.
But that’s terribly sad, isn’t it?
What expectations are so unrealistic? Happily ever after?
How do we become so jaded as adults? And when did it happen?
I was always a dreamer growing up. I dared to dream things that my friends thought were crazy - like going to Europe, graduating from college, becoming a lawyer. And those things came true. And yeah, I also dreamed about marrying a wealthy prince and ruling the world - I’m a little off the mark on those. I suspect marrying a self-employed lawyer and being Vice President of my local development corporation weren’t exactly what I had in mind at the time. But they’ve worked out okay for me…
But, now only in my 30s, I’ve let my dreams take a back seat, sometimes for legitimate reasons but mostly because getting older and supposedly wiser means giving up on those dreams. At least that’s what convention tells me.
And I wonder if that’s what happens to people. Maybe that’s what happened to my mom. She’s scared to do new things anymore, travel to new places. She used to be practically fearless - she once led two tour buses of teenage girls from southeastern North Carolina to Fort Worth, Texas, planning the whole thing herself. I thought Mom could do anything. Now she is content to sit in her house and read old cowboy books. It’s not the Mom I know. I have a whole host of speculations as to why and how it happened. And it scares me a lot. Because I think she kind of fell into this complacency. I think it’s what happens to us when we stop believing in dreams and fairy tales.
I’ve been tired a lot lately. And more than a little melancholy. I’m terribly worried that my life is passing me by - and I am scrambling on the sidelines, just trying to get things in order from one minute to the next. I fear I’ve given up on my dreams. I used to make wine in my apartment (yes, it’s true) and dreamed of owning a winery… I wrote and dreamed of getting my book published… I dreamed of hiking the Appalachian Trail… and seeing the Macchu Pichu. I had a whole list (maybe I can dig it up for the blog tomorrow) of things I wanted to do. And somewhere along the line, I stopped dreaming of those things and spent far too much time and energy fighting the wrong battles and allowing mundane experiences to wear me down. I don’t know if I can ever get that spirit back again.
And it’s not my imagination. Chris sent me an email last week about our busy schedules that said, among other things, “I’m concerned that life is knocking the spirit out of you, which would be a very sad thing.” I agree.
So maybe that’s my beef with fairy tales. Maybe I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t believe in dreams and happily ever after - and I don’t want anyone else to, either. And that’s not fair.
I think I want my girls to believe in lots of things - themselves, other people, and yes, their dreams. Right now, Katie so wants to be a princess because she thinks that princesses are beautiful and happy. And what’s wrong with that, really? Why is it a terrible thing to make wishes and have dreams? What’s wrong with wanting to believe in fairy tales? When and if I figure these things out, I’ll let you know.