Oh noes!

It had to happen sometimes, I reckon.

So the kid has turned ten, and yesterday, she dresses herself -- which she does frequently, that's not the shocking part, I often let her pick out her own clothing -- anyway, she puts on bright red trousers and a light blue shirt with bright blue flowers on it, white socks, and purple crocs.

As usual, I make no comment. I am not in the business of wincing at my child's (or mr. delagar's) taste in clothing. (Well, this is a lie: on occasional, when she has appeared in outfits even more outlandish than these, I have sent her back to try one more time. (No, you will not wear a bright yellow skirt with a bright green tank top and flipflops to school in the middle of winter. Because I say so, that's why.)

Why do I make no comment? Ho! You should see the way I dress. As my students said, observing the kid lying on the floor in Chaucer class one day in her purple shirt and vaguely lavender trousers under a gray sweater, "She's got your taste, dr. delagar."

ANYWAY: as I started to say: we were walking toward a wide glass door at the university, me in my jeans and very worn Buddha teeshirt, the kid in her red and blue and purple, and our reflections were ascending to meet us, and she gazed at herself and said, in a tone of utter dismay, "My outfit doesn't match!"

"Mmm," I said. "It doesn't, does it?"

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Eh," I said.

"I look -- GOOFY!"

"A bit," I conceded, and added, "They're only clothes. Do you think Buddha would care?"

She rolled her eyes.

Then? Today? As we're going into the orthodontists? I said, "Don't you want to take off that sweater? It's kind of hot."

"No," she informed me. "I like it. It makes my outfit snazzy."

Yikes. She's a GIRL!!