It was early winter, and I had just gotten a new tank top set. It was white, with blue, green, and red palm trees on it, and the brand was Jet Set. I remember the brand name because I thought it sounded so grown-up and sophisticated. Made me sound like I should be on Falcon Crest or something.

I had decided Jet-Set Karen would make her glamorous debut at school the next day. So the following morning I padded downstairs in the tank top and shorts, ready to knock 'em dead, grade-school style.

"You can't wear that," my mom said.

The walls began to close in on me. I couldn't breathe. I even began to stutter a little.

"B-b-but I want to wear it today."

Foolish me! As if desire had anything to do with it. At eight, you see, I still thought I could bend the world to my will—that if I wanted it badly enough, the mere act of wearing shorts could turn the tide of the seasons backward. Cruel lessons to learn.

As I should have expected, my mother stuck to her guns. "Well, you can't wear it, sweetie. It's winter. You can wear it when it gets warm again, okay?" She gave me a sympathetic look and continued making breakfast.

I stuck out my lower lip and produced the most pathetic pout of my career. I readied myself to turn on the water works, if needed. "But I really want to," I said quietly, and, clasping my hands together serenely, did an impression of one of those sad-eyed Precious Moments dolls. I had not yet learned that this approach rarely works with mothers. And it didn't work this time.

"Sorry, hon."

That was it, then.

Faced with the prospect of such crushing disappointment, strategy went out the window. I threw a monumental tantrum. I cried and I stomped, and through it all I chanted "it's not fair," faster and faster until I sounded like a Hare Krishna on meth.

It was not pretty.

And then something alarming happened.

"Fine," she said.

There was a thick silence, during which I tried to process what had happened. When you're a kid throwing a tantrum, and you finally get what you want, there's always that moment when you wonder if whatever it is is really worth the price you are paying for it. Hearing my mother say that one word—with so much tension in her voice—reminded me of the green, still sky, just before a tornado. It was scary.

I just stood there. "Oh," I said. And I knew something was horribly wrong. But then I looked down at the blue, green, and red palm trees on my shorts, and knew I couldn't give up the chance to show off the new Falcon Crest version of myself. So out I went.

The moment I stepped outside, of course, I was sorry for it all. Sorry for the tantrum, sorry for what I had said to my mother—but most of all, sorry that I had insisted on going outside in a tank top and shorts in November. But if I was anything, I was stubborn, and so I clutched my lunch box tightly and began the three-block trek to school. This is probably a good point to mention that while I was young, my parents spent a lot of time reading books with names like, "The Strong-Willed Child," in hopes of getting some insight into my behavior. Not sure they helped much.

Somehow I made it to school, although I must have been nothing but a little Karen-sicle by the time I got there. Things were great, and I got lots of comments on my snazzy outfit. Some of these were comments expressing puzzlement—asking me if I realized what month it was—but I didn't let this bother me. After all, the matriarch on Falcon Crest didn't care if everyone liked her, right? I was the center of attention, and I was living it up. At least, until recess.

Our elementary school had a pretty big playground, and one section of it had about five or six enormous tractor tires for the kids to play on. They were great for hide and seek, since you could almost stand up in one without being seen. This particular recess, however, I had to crawl inside one of them to get shelter from the Arctic winds. It was miserable. I kept having flashbacks to Hans Christian Andersen's story of the Little Match Girl (what kind of a children's story is this, anyway?), who froze to death with her hand over her box of matches. And for the second time that day, I learned my lesson. The Little Match Girl had no home to go to, and no warm clothes to wear. I had both of those things. If I froze to death, it would be because of my own stupidity.

When I was older, it occurred to me that none of this could have transpired without my teacher's consent. No self-respecting teacher would have allowed a barely clad child to be outside when the weather was so cold, unless she had explicit instructions from the child's mother. My mother and teacher were obviously in a conspiracy to break my stubborn will.

To this day, my mother swears none of this ever happened. "I would never send you out in the cold dressed like that," she says, feigning horror. And then she changes the subject—a little too quickly. Of course, it's possible that I've exaggerated the incident. It's possible that over many years this story has accrued layer upon layer of hyperbole, until it finally transformed itself into the monstrous tale that I tell you today. Such a thing is possible.

But this is the way I remember it happening. And that's what matters.