Fairy tale Endings

While flipping through our 6 channels the other night, I stopped on a news program. A reporter was interviewing some obscure prince from some obscure European locale.

The conversation was about how most members of royalty today are pretty ordinary people and don't possess a lot of wealth or power. The reporter proceeded to ask, what was, in my opinion, the most irrelevant question possible: Considering all of that, do you think it is still healthy or good for little girls to pretend to be princesses?

Seriously, that was her question? Yeah, because when most little girls dress up and assume a princess persona they are identifying with actual royalty. Give me a break. Now, if she were addressing one of the top execs at Disney about the expectations they help create, then the question may actually have sounded plausible.

I did agree with the answer the prince gave though, as he seemed to have more sense than the person doing the interview. His basic response was that he saw no harm in little girls pretending that way, but if they were still thinking in those terms by the time they were 16 and hoping to marry a prince just because he bore the title, then there was a problem. Agreed.

The life of a child is not about having both feet planted firmly on the ground. It is about make-believe, fantasy, and fairy tale endings. It's about frogs that talk, glass slippers that are comfortable, and wishes that really do come true. Little girls don't pretend to be princesses because of wealth or power, it's because they like sparkly things and dressing up and they like the idea of a world where the animals talk and good always triumphs over evil.

Children wake up to reality soon enough. Why not join in the fun and pretend to during those moments before the harshness of the world clouds the idea that there's always a happy ending and justice is not necessarily handed out on this earth, in our time.

The coolest part of all of it, though, is that we really are royalty and my baby girl really is a princess because her Father is the King of kings and the Lord of lords, and through that blood, she has already been given a crown. And one day, when she's older, she'll understand how her crown was purchased by a loving God through the sacrifice of His son and a crown of thorns.