Fairytales

So much for my happy ending.

When I was a little girl, I read all of the fairytale books, and believed every word to be the truth. I’ve had a lifelong obsessive love with shoes (thanks Cinderella!), I believed that animals can – and do! – sing (pick a princess, they all have shooby-doo-ing animals in there somewhere), and I love vertically-challenged people (Snow White, that one is ALL you, girlfriend!). The princesses weren’t everywhere in the late ’70s like they are now (thank god), but still the idea of the princess, the prince and the happily ever after has been deeply ingrained in me from the word go.

This is not the worst thing to have happen, I suppose – it’s nice to believe in  good things happening to good people. However, I do fear that these stories have set me up for failure in life: my expectations are unrealistic, I frequently feel disappointed in others, and things haven’t turned out so happily ever after – and that sucks.

Case in point: I have this extreme longing for a grand gesture. I mean EXTREME. Do you know what I mean by the grand gesture? Something like this:

Isn’t that fantastic? I love it   That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about…where someone loves you SO much that they go out, plan something so unique and special and freaking awesome…and they do it JUST. FOR. YOU. I love that stuff…and it NEVER happens to me. I’m usually the one who plans nice things for others (probably because I’m a psychotic Type A control freak who is obsessed with planning,…but that’s a story for another blog post), and yet here I sit, day after day, waiting…and nothing.

The princesses have led me to expect a prince on a white horse, and a knight in shining armor…and most of what I’ve encountered in my life has been more dumbasses in tinfoil. I don’t expect the jewels and the riches (although diamonds are always this girl’s best friend), but I do want the lavishing of attention. I’ve been called an attention hound before, and I’ll agree with that - I am. I want someone to pay me attention -and lots of it. Is that so bad? Hopefully not. It doesn’t really matter how much of an attention hound I am – this doggie ain’t getting no attention bone. See? More disappointment.

I have a five year old little girl who LOVES princesses, and every day when we discuss them (which we do – every day), I try to tell her about the princesses but also remind her that they aren’t real, and that she can’t expect Prince Eric to show up and sweep her off her mermaid tail (my kid doesn’t have a tail, I hasten to add)…and that those things aren’t real. Yet, I don’t want to completely destroy her idea of happily ever after, like life has destroyed mine – she’s five, and she deserves to hold on to that, for a little while at least. It’s only recently that I’ve had to let go of mine…and, while I’m sure this is part of the path to a better, more realistic life – I miss the dream.

xxx

PS: But I still refuse to stop believing in singing animals.

PS Again: If you happen to be someone who knows me in real life, PLEASE don’t even think about attempting a grand gesture in my direction after reading this – it won’t count, since I wrote about it first…and it’ll make me feel even more pitiful than I already do. Thanks.