A big piece of my childhood has just passed away. Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson have left this World… early. (She from a long battle against cancer and he from undetermined causes that lead to cardiac arrest.) It is a strange feeling that I am experiencing with this news. I did not know either person personally. I have simply enjoyed their personas from the audience like so many others. But their impact on my life is unmistakeable. I speak today of Farrah Fawcett.
When Farrah became the number one female television star I was early in my elementary school experience; the only ethnic child in an all white Catholic school. I was a young, multi-racial girl with full head of mixed chic hair, and a loving white mother who really had no frame of reference for how to deal with it. Just like every other girl, I wanted so badly to look like Farrah; to have the trademark Farrah Fawcett hair cut, feathered and bouncing in the wind.

Tonight I am finally getting around to watching the 
Yesterday a milestone was very quietly reached. My youngest daughter finished Kindergarten. When my elder children reached this milestone there was much pomp and circumstance. There were a ceremonies, complete with songs, poetry, certificates, and cake. Parents were crowded into to hot and stuffy gyms all vying for the best picture of their well dressed 6 year old as they crossed over into the World of bonafide elementary school. But not yesterday. Yesterday my youngest child wasn?t wearing her Sunday finest, but instead her sister?s hand me down pants that were about an inch and a half too long, one pink and one green sneaker,( thankfully from the same shoe style and make), a striped shirt, and a hap-hazard ponytail, (filled with a mass of tangled curls desperately in need of shampoo). Instead of a ceremony she and her classmates decorated yellow baseball caps to look like duck faces, complete with an orange felt bill and googly eyes. Instead of a stuffy gym there was an open air playground. And instead of cake there was popsicles! All of us parents were tightly gathered at the outside door of the school, just like any other day, awaiting the dismissal of our kids. And just like any other day my daughter and her classmates came rushing out the school door in a blur of energetic shrills. (But today they were all wearing their duck hats.) The children poured out onto the playground to meet us and most importantly to have their popsicles. The teachers sat on the playground benches posing for random pictures with their charges as parents milled around, not quite sure what to do. I brought giant sunflowers for my daughter which I was then relegated to carry as I followed her around the equipment like a sherpa. As she played she gradually shed various pieces of her clothing and props, such as her raincoat, her new duck necklace, her popsicle trash and the like, all of which I was relegated to watch over like the good ?Sherpa Mommy? that I am. While balancing all of this accoutrement I was able to catch a couple of candid shots of her and her sticky classmates in a feeble attempt to cement the occasion in my mind for future reflection.
The other day I received one of many event notices from
Heidi Stevens is a Chicago-based writer and editor. You’ll find her writing every week in the 






