About sweatpants.
Let me explain:
Because he hadn't been potty trained a year yet, and because he has trouble with jeans flys (and because I don't like the look of elastic-band jeans), I took to dressing The Boy in fleece sweatpants this past fall. But I've gotten a little tired of the sweatpants. And I think his dad has as well. And they're not exactly a polished look.... Still, he does look cute in them, because he looks cute in everything.
So I decided to try to transition us out of sweatpants. Accordingly, when I bought some new size 4T pants for the guy recently, I did get a couple of pairs of sweatpants, but I also got these cute elastic-band gray cammo cargo pants. They even have lots of cool pockets for carrying rocks and acorns and hotwheels and sticks! With these awesome pants, I would move The Boy into normal pants and away from the sweatpants.
These were the pants that I wanted him to wear today. The cute elastic-band gray cammo cargo pants.
He demurred.
Actually, he flatly refused; I got irritated; he said he didn't like them; I asked him why; he said that they were too big; I said, "You can't know that; you've never put them on;" and just like that, I was trying to force the pants onto his little body while he said, "Stop it, stop it, stop it!"
That's when my husband said, "We don't have to do this today," and he went to the closet to retrieve some sweatpants.
And he's right. We didn't have to do that today. Who, other than me, cares if he wears sweatpants today? Completely irrational behavior on the part of the mommy.... Basically, I didn't get my way.
For better than 15 years, I've given the following advice to people in various circumstances at various moments in time: If what you are worrying about or upset about will matter in 5 years, then it's probably worth your worry today. If it won't matter in 5 years, you should let it go right now.
Whether The Boy wore sweatpants or cargo pants today will not matter in 2020. We wouldn't even remember what he wore today at all, five years hence, but for that pointless fight that was entirely my fault and this blog post.
And The Boy looks adorable today in his black sweatpants and green Lego men shirt (which is, in fact, the item of clothing I laid out that is actually too big).
So I'm not going to do it anymore. I'm going to take my own advice. If it won't matter five years from now, I'm not going to have a battle with my son about it.
Before I went to work, I apologized to him for the fight. He seemed unphased, but who knows. I hope the memory of battling his mom over cargo v. sweatpants will not linger for him (like it will surely linger for me), will not be one of those childhood memories he carries forever. But from now on, I vow, I resolve, not to sweat the small stuff. Life's too short to fight your kid over, e.g., sweatpants.
