Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Princessitude

I was going to the wood shed to chop wood, and I needed a flashlight as it was already dark. Sadly, the electrical in the shed doesn't work, and no one could come with me, so a visitor offered her head lamp. It's a tiny LED flashlight mounted to an elastic headband, and it's pink and very fancy.

"Oooh," I swooned facetiously. "The fancy pink one, no less!" I turned it on and pulled it around my head.

She smirked and took on a regal air and said, "Oh yes. Don't you just feel like a princess?"

I responded with a simple affirmative and went out to the shed to batter the wood into usable shapes for the furnace indoors. But as I swung the axe over my head and tossed the split logs into my wood tote, I wondered if I really did feel like a princess, or if I even could.

I wondered whether people who feel like princesses even know. How would I know if I felt like a princess? So I imagined what a princess would feel like. And I developed a mental list, some of which I've surely forgotten by now.

1) Very important, like her opinion really mattered.
2) Like she could say or do almost anything at all with few repercussions, if any.
3) Universally loved.
4) In charge - like she could delegate things she didn't want to do.
5) Kind.
6) Generous.
7) Like she had a certain lightness in her step and a rare grace.
8) More intelligent than most people, if not everyone.
9) A greater judge of fashion than just about everyone.
10) Enviable.

Based on this list, I found myself lacking in the proper qualities a princess might possess. Out of the ten possible princessly properties I imagined, I could only lay claim to perhaps four. And even in some of those, my credentials seemed weak, making my claim to feeling like a princess a dubious one.

It was with great shame that I returned with my wood tote full, but my heart empty. For I had to admit that I did not, in fact, feel like a princess. And all the pink LED headlamps in the world could not help me.

2 comments:

Lil said...

There are few words to describe how truly humorous I find this. Because, in part, the entire time I read I imagine you with that pink thing-a-ma-bobber on your head.

So there it is.

But you know, when I think of princesses, I think of the princess in Disney's Aladdin (oh, how woefully girly that reveals me). Remember the caged-bird scene in the garden where I believe she speaks to her pet tiger? She says, as she looks into the water in the fountain, "Maybe I don't want to BE a princess anymore!"

Somewhat petulant. But dare we assume, dear Pastry Chef, that you would even care to BE a princess? Sure, you might get a tiger (and that's a big MIGHT) but what about the caged-bird syndrome? Think of all the angst dear Jasmine displayed in that moment!

So, maybe a owning a tiger or donning a pink thing-a-ma-bobber on your head doesn't make you a princess. That's a bummer, but its trauma from which I am assured you will recover.

I think a princess is more like the princess and the pea situation. A true princess can detect things. Yes! DETECT! Kind of like a spy. And perhaps it's about noticing the nuances of everything from the politics that plague the royal court to listing a bunch of Princess Attributes as one wields an ax. Perhaps.

I think you have a princess inside. But on the outside? Clearly, as the ax indicates, you are gruff and manly.

Much love, princess :)

ayveol!

Jeff Barbose said...

I got six.

and I need to see pictures.