Orangeboy has an orange t-shirt from our trip to San Francisco bay that says, "Alcatraz Penitentiary" and has prisoner #4743 1/2 on it. You know - it looks like an inmate shirt.
I really wanted to get him the green scrubs shirt that had printed over the pocket,
"Alcatraz Psychiatric Ward Outpatient", but my DH had some objections. He especially felt that it wouldn't go over well with the grandparents.
So even though I thought the image of the boy and his squinty, darting eyes with that scrubs shirt drooping off his skinny shoulders was appropriately hilarious, we bought the orange standard issue instead.
So Orangeboy was going to wear this Alcatraz shirt to school yesterday for the first time. He laid it out with his jeans the night before and I praised his choice.
Later that night; however, I had a sudden change of heart that woke me from my slumber. I suddenly remembered that sometimes school dress codes are controversial and that across our great country there have been skirmishes over what is "appropriate" and "inappropriate" at school. I began to worry that someone might find the Alcatraz inmate shirt to be OFFENSIVE. Even though Alcatraz was closed as a prison in the 60's and is far away from where we live - you just never know. There was a child in my daughter's class last year whose Dad was in jail for awhile...
So first thing in the morning, I jumped up and confiscated the shirt before he could put it on. I found another shirt that he likes and hoped this would not throw off his whole morning.
I was really thinking that it would be better not to take a chance on getting a call from the school telling me, "Your son's shirt is inappropriate and we will have him wait here in the office until you can bring him suitable attire." Something like that could throw a wrench in his entire life.
Because the worst part would be that Orangeboy would probably NEVER, EVER wear a shirt with any words printed on it again - JUST IN CASE.
He sometimes appears to take the high road when in reality he is taking the safe road - or the
I-Don't-Trust-These-People-and-Will-Make-Sure-They-Don't-Do-This-To-Me-Again Road.
It would be much too complicated for him to try and figure out what-in-the-world could be offensive to someone and what would not. Even the socially adequate and inclined haven't quite figured that out yet!
My daughter enters school this year, and we performed the deplorable ritual of seeing if she owned anything that might be offensive - she doesn't of course.
ReplyDeleteMy friends and I were out for drinks and tried to decide what tee shirt a kid could wear that would absolutely immune to being offensive.
We didn't come up with any good ideas until we turned a few drinks into a few drinks followed by all of their friends.
It's really a lot harder than you'd think.