Know Thy Enemy

So one day my ten year old daughter and I are talking about breasts, puberty and other subjects when she once again caught me by surprise.

"Can I look at bras?"

"You mean like a training bra?"

"Yeah."

"You want to try them on?"

"No...I wanna know what I'm up against."

I'm not kidding. She made bra shopping sound like a recon mission into an enemy camp.

"Uh, yeah. How about next week?"

No emotion, just one word to ready herself for battle.

"Okay."

So before the Big Day--which, I tried to not make a big deal of--I did a little spying myself. Incognito as a harried mother, I traversed the aisle of Macy's, JC Penney, Justice and The Children's Place. This is what I found:

--The Children's Place was a no-go.
--Justice has their logo plastered on every article of clothing. Since I didn't want Sarah to resemble a human billboard (or pay $13 for one athletic bra) I decided we're not buying there.
--JC Penney has an okay selection; read: they have a lot of training bras, but not for slender-shouldered girls.
--Macy's good selection of athletic bras for young ladies with narrow frames. Reasonable prices. Some had pink bows.

I didn't know what to expect when the battle happened. Does any warrior? Mostly we went from one store to the other, me acting as tour guide, "Hi and welcome to the world of bras. Please note the following accessories and details." I knew Sarah was feeling "icked out" when she decided to look at anything besides the bras. She had some good points to make though.

"Seriously? Padding in a training bra? Who needs that?" and "Ooh! Pink bow!"

As battles with demons from the deep go, it wasn't exactly "smote his ruin upon the mountainside." But she who shops and runs away...