Clementine asked Linette to cut her hair this weekend, and Linette did. She cut a few inches off, making it pretty much shoulder-length. Afterward, Clementine said that she liked it. Then, she said, “Maybe Jill will like me now that I have hair like Sue.”

Linette and I knew that there would be things like this to deal with one day - we were just hoping that we’d have a few more years to bolster her confidence and prepare her for the sad reality of life, which is that most people suck, and far too many get off on making others feel badly about themselves.

[The names of all children other than Clementine have been changed so as not to focus too much public scorn on the parents of the new mean girl, who has introduced the concept of the clique to a classroom of little girls who had, up until that point, played fairly nicely with one another.]