Year of the Rabbit with a Cheetah Vest

It is the year of the Rabbit; a time to recuperate and lollygag. The Rabbit symbolizes graciousness, kindness, good manners and good taste.  The Rabbit is sensitive to beauty.

As a mother of one beautiful 5 year old daughter, I worry about the growing slippery slope that society is pushing us down in the commercial deluge of manufactured beauty. And, I am highly aware of the pushed beyond envelope of sex that litters my home in Tampa.

Each day, I drive my daughter to school. Our trip is several miles along the main streets of our city. She and I see more than a dozen strip clubs and sexy massage "clinics. We pass numerous billboards with 20 year old bikini clad girls marketing lunch face lifts, body wraps, botox and medical drug induced weight loss. We pass proliferating "sexy play" dress and accessory shops.  At Christmas, a cute female lawyer advertised her legal prowess in a sexy Santa suit.

God, if I swam with the current,  I should have stopped at my many local "gigantic box" stores to buy my daughter the new Vet Barbie and told her that Vet Barbie could easily straddle our 85 pound bull terrier to clip her paw nails in her tight Vet miniskirt! 

No. My daughter is out of luck. I didn't buy the Vet Barbie, and (snapping my fingers as I type) I never thought of wearing a Santa suit when I peddled legal services in my former law career. Perhaps, this is a reason for my high debt load.

Silly Dilly Tot Spot, my artsy, imaginative snow globe of childhood wonderment would undoubtedly make much more money if it were Silly Dilly Hot Spot and we sold volumes of sexy gear with a drive-through weight loss/wrinkle tuck window.

Tampa is not the only city where one can develop this viewpoint. National ad campaigns and the Disney Channel ratchet sex down to 7 & 8 year old levels and in my view chip away at childhood.

On Monday, while in the Atlanta airport returning from a successful winter clothing buying excursion at the Atlanta market, another buyer (who is a grandmother) and myself simultaneously stopped in our tracks and gawked at a life-size advertisement for perfume. Two teenage looking kids, a boy and a girl, were scantily clad and the girl was licking the perfume bottle.

I read that people were outraged and disgusted by a Doritos commercial that aired during the Superbowl featuring the licks of a hungry man.  Will people be likewise disgusted by the public display and commercialism of the licks done by a cute 20 year old girl?  I think not.


So as a mom proud of life etchings on my face and a healthy dose of cupcake fat, it is imperative that my child receive repetitive messages of natural beauty and an appropriate, tasteful public display of it. Balanced information is key to enlightened learning. 

As I said, I live in Tampa. Sun, year long, means more skin shows. Okay, I get it. We all desire toned arms and bellies. When I lived in CT and Boston, I relished the winter. Layers of woolens comforting our weathered bodies. When Spring came, it was irrelevant that we had gained winter weight and wrinkles.

My mother always says, "You can not best nature." She says this when we watch the sun set. When we stroll through a meadow of daffodils. When we collect crisp colorful leaves that have just fallen. When we hear the crackle of a freezing lake. When we smell the sweet smell of just mowed meadow grass.

I agree with this sentiment. You can not best nature. This applies to our environment and our bodies. I also believe that you can work with nature to enhance its beauty.

In Atlanta, I passed over many racks of revealing, polyester clothing marketed to 5 year olds in favor of beautifully designed and sewn clothing with fabrics that I yearned to find in adult sizes.

Sure, I paired a soft grey sweater dress with tights and a cheetah print vest for my daughter and for other customers who follow our design sensibility. Tasteful dressing does not mean dressing without style. My style choices would never be described as frumpy.

May the stars bless the grande dame I saw in the airport who had a debonair gentleman on her arm. She clutched a weighty Prada bag in her thinly thin arms. She precariously swayed in her high heeled ankle boots that were capped with a large band of cheetah print fur. She must have been cold as it was 40 degrees out and I seriously doubt that the glittery spandex leggings and tie front sweater with faux cheetah collar that she wore kept her warm.

I am a fan of fashion and a fan of function. As I watched her shiver, I felt toasty in my long black faux fur coat and embroidered clog boots. 

And when a blistering wind rushed in with the screeching train, I could have sworn that I heard the metal on metal cry: "CHEETAH".