Princess Penny

Sorry I've been gone so long. Things have been crazy since finals and that is really all the explanation I am going to give.

So, every little girl is familiar with princesses. They're beautiful, they sing, they talk to animals, they marry the prince and live happily ever after.
As a little girl I firmly believed that I was a princess. As I grew up and realized that there were other requirements to be a real princess, I decided that one day I would marry a prince of royal blood from another country and become a princess by marriage. The prince I selected for this was Prince Amedeo of Belgium. It hasn't worked out yet. As I approached my teenage years, I decided I would have to become a different princess all together and began researching working as Princess Aurora from Disney's Sleeping Beauty at Disneyland. Despite all my years of scheming to gain this coveted royal title (I must interject that I only want to be a princess and not a queen. Not only does 'queen' sound like a lot more work, I have this picture in mind, most likely spawned from various pictures of the almost immortal Queen Victoria, that all queens are old and mean. Victoria's son was actually quoted saying 'I can endure praying to the eternal father, but I am the only man cursed with an eternal mother') I have yet to have gained it the sense I sought. However, there have been many instances where I have become a princess for a few little girls looking for one.

One summer I babysat three little girls every day. They were between the ages of 3 to 9 and we had all sorts of activities we would do. One of which would be I would take them to a thrift store and we would try on donated fancy dresses, strange shoes, and other random things that are fun in thrift stores. One day they found a wedding dress section with three dresses on it. And we just couldn't leave until they had put one of the dresses on me. I went into the dressing room stall and emerged in full white puffy dress glory. And when I had emerged (complete with a faux flower bouquet they had found in the home decor section) their little eyes gaped in awe. When their mother came to pick them up that day, the three year old ran to her mother and said "Mom, did you know Penny is a princess? You just have to put her in a pretty dress." We all nearly fell over laughing.

The most recent time where I was dubbed a princess was around Christmas. I was working at the Las Vegas Fashion Show Mall at Bath and Body Works. I had finally escaped from a long shift (holiday hours will drive a retail girl to insanity, if the regular customers haven't already and she didn't kill anybody during Black Friday) and I was grumpy (again retail is not an easy job). I was walking out of the mall passed the Pictures with Santa line, dressed in my black slacks, black tank top, and white over-shirt, and was just shaking out my tight ponytail when I was grabbed by the hand. I look down and a little girl, who I didn't know, had attached herself to me. As I stand there stunned looking for this child's parental units who have allowed her to escape, the girl looks to the line to her concerned mother and says "Mom I want MY picture taken with the PRINCESS!" It took me a second to figure out that she was reluctantly getting her picture taken with Santa. And who really wants a fat bearded old man when you can have a picture with a princess? I leaned down to her and tried to explain that I wasn't really a princess to which I was sternly told "You're in disguise!" Who am I to argue when a little girl insists that I am a princess, especially if she found me out through my clever disguise. I walked her back in line to her mother, who was holding her not even crawling other child. I talked to the mother and asked if she would like some help from this princess. She accepted. In my princess form, I assured the girl that Santa was a good guy too, and she smiled big for the Christmas picture. And when it was all done, she did get her picture with her princess in disguise. It is strange to think that it might end up in that family's photo album and be remember as 'that one time in the mall'. To have that just floating about the world weirds me out. But I do hope to that little girl I will always remain her hidden princess.