German-born American developmental psychologist Erik Erikson said, “Every adult, whether he is a follower or a leader, a member of a mass or of an elite, was once a child.  He was once small.  A sense of smallness forms a substratum in his mind, ineradicably.  His triumphs will be measured against this smallness; his defeats will substantiate it.”  When I was a little girl I always hated dresses and I particularly despised bows.  My mother and I finally made a deal after kindergarten:  I would wear a dress to make her happy for the first day of school and then I got to wear jeans and pants the rest of the year, except for church of course.  We shopped at Sears and they had this brand called Toughskins jeans.  If your kid could manage to put a hole in them you’d get a free pair.  My mother got about three a year on average.  I was recently dismayed to learn my much-more-femine-than-I daughter has been called a boy by other boys at school.  She always wears dresses but does, for the most part, eschew bows.  I adore anything French and I truly think she has a Rembrandt quality to her with her dark, French eyes when she wears them.  However this picture is the very largest bow we ever wear; I cannot STAND “bow heads”.  The poor little girls look like something out of Dr. Seuss — all bows, no faces, and (seemingly) no substance; just a big giant bow.  To learn they called my beautiful girl a boy hurt me and reopened old childhood wounds of my own.  I was a Tomboy and most girls were mean to me.  I do not want that for my little one.  I notice, like I was in school, she seems very popular but doesn’t really have any close friends.  My husband and I are both lone wolves (as were my parents) and I wonder if she’ll be the same.  She is fierce, independent, funny, kind, creative and brave.  I think she is drawn to the boys much like I was — not because she is boy crazy; rather she is just more adventurous.  However some of the boys are pushing her and hitting her.  My mother was the sweetest woman in the world but very passive.  My husband is also the sweetest man (next to Daddy) I have ever known but he is passive as well.  I worry she does not have my aggression, and I lament the fact that the word itself is considered to be negative.  Aggression to me is strength and assertiveness.  She is always kind and gentle and will never hit back.  I never hit anyone as a child either but my father made sure I stood up for myself.  Tonight she earned her sixth belt in karate and it is my hope she will be quick enough to avoid their aggression in the future.  If not, I hope she takes them down at the knees.