When Libby was little Mom would put her in cute dresses for church and she loved it. Skirts that would twirl, puffed sleeves, ribbons, bows, and flowers; she adored all of her dresses. Well, almost all of them. There was one that she never wore and here is why.
The dress was a brown jumper with mustard yellow turtleneck. There were several reasons why Libby didn’t like this outfit. For one it was brown and brown was not a color she liked to wear. Libby liked bright, happy colors like pink and red and blue and purple. Brown was not a bright happy color and she wasn’t particularly fond the yellowish turtleneck either. Secondly, the jumper was made of corduroy and very plain. There were no bows, no flowers, and no shape, not even a fitted waist. It was a very simple jumper and Libby did not like it.
The outfit was in the back of Libby’s closet and she didn’t plan on wearing it. However, one Sunday morning Mom pulled it out and laid it on Libby’s bed.
“Mom! I don’t wanna wear that.” She whined when she saw it.
“It’s so cute though. Come on, you can wear it to church today.” Mom said. Libby pulled a face and Mom tried to reason with her. “You have to wear it so we can tell Grandma that you wore it.”
“But Mooooomm….” Libby protested.
“Libby, this is a perfectly good dress and it’s very pretty. I wish I had a dress like this.” Mom cajoled.
“Can’t I wear my dress with the swirly skirt and the red bows? It’s my favorite!”
“You wear that every Sunday. Grandma bought this dress for you, don’t you like her gift?”
“Well, what about the blue one with the white sweater? She gave me that one too!”
“Libby, that’s a summer dress. Its November now, it’s too cold for that dress.”
“How abou-“ Libby began.
“Elizabeth,” Mom said in her no nonsense voice, “you will wear this dress today. I don’t want to hear any more about it.” After giving the sad little girl a stern look Mom left her to get dressed. Once she was alone Libby gave into her feelings. She grumbled and whined and complained about the dress as she put it on.
“I don’t like this dress! It’s so ugly. It’s brown! Yleck.” She picked up the shirt and held it at arm’s length. “It’s the same color as that spicy mustard Dad puts on hot dogs.” She made another face and then started tugging the shirt on. She pulled on her stockings and then regretfully and slowly began to put on the jumper. She couldn’t deny that it fit well and it was warm, but it was not frilly and therefore she didn’t like it. She finished the snaps and looked in the mirror. A very grumpy little girl looked back at her and Libby sighed as she turned to get her shoes.
“Libby! Hurry up so I can do your hair.” Mom called. Libby plodded from her room to her mother’s and stood in the doorway waiting for Mom to turn around.
“Oh, you look so cute. I’ll braid your hair and then you will be all ready to go.” Mom ignored the sour look on her daughter’s face and quickly brushed and braided her hair.
“There. Go show Daddy how pretty you look.” Libby shot her mother a look of disgust that would have gotten her in a lot of trouble if her mother had seen it. Fortunately for her, Mom had already turned away. Libby was determined to be sullen and muttered to herself as she went down the stairs.
“Pretty? A person can’t look pretty in brown ‘cause brown isn’t a pretty color. Pretty!” She scoffed. “Pink is pretty. Blue is pretty. Brown is not pretty.” She walked into the kitchen where her father was finishing his coffee. As he looked up and saw her, he had no idea how his next words were going to affect his daughter.
“Well, now! You look like a chocolate bar!” Libby instantly burst into tears as Mom walked into the room. Seeing her in tears, Mom endeavored to find out what was wrong.
“What’s the matter? What happened?”
“I – don’t – want – to wear – this – dress!” Libby sputtered as she sobbed.
“Why not? It’s a beautiful dress!”
“No it’s not! It’s ugly and brown and-and-and-and”
“And what?”
“And it makes me look like a chocolate bar!” she wailed.
“No, no it doesn’t. Nobody said that, who would say that?”
“Daddy did! He said I looked like a chocolate bar!” Mom looked over at Dad with exasperation.
“Do you know how much trouble I had getting her to put this dress on?” she said.
“Come on, Nick. Let’s go start the car.” He said, laughing. He thought the whole thing was extremely funny and left Mom with Libby, who was adamantly stating how much she hated her dress. Later that day when they got home from church she rushed upstairs, took off the dress, crumpled it into a heap and stuffed it into the back of the closet. Needless to say, she never wore it again.
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