My town/city has a fall festival it calls Octoberfest that always takes place during the last weekend of September. Yes, it's a community full of these random idiosyncrasies. On top of having the September/Octoberfest this weekend, Amigo's school (and one other) had their Homecoming weekends. It's a busy weekend all around.
Autumn is like that. To me, the New Year starts in the fall with the harvesting of garden produce, ripe apples everywhere, and the start of school. To my kids, as old as they are, it's the same way. But to them it's not a Harvest Festival: it's Homecoming.
When I picked up Amigo after last year's dance, the first person I saw on the chaperone duty was a Police Liaison officer I'd worked with in an elementary school. I waved, he laughed, and then he told me, "These kids are scary! They're big, they smell bad, and they talk back to you!" Oh, it's true, my Sgt. friend hadn't yet experienced the joys and delights of teenagers. His eldest child was a whopping seven years old, and the kids he worked with in his liaison job were 6th graders at most, mainly age 12. Even the lawbreakin' ones still had high voices and carried High School Musical backpacks. Not so at this dance!
He had yet to have his own child both love him and then hate him within hours, if not minutes. He hadn't seen the meltdown that comes with not having the exact right pair of jeans, and clean, on the first day of school. His parenting skills hadn't been subjected to the ruler of "Mean" and "Unfair" by teen standards. In fact, his little kiddo willingly woke up in the mornings! Before noon! Without grumbling and grunting! And the boy-girl baggage that goes with teens? Let's not even go there. Really. Let's not go there -- because as soon as I described my teen (big guy, cowboy hat, white cane) to the good Sgt., he exclaimed, "Oh, I know who he is! I saw him dancing with a really pretty girl just a little while ago." He leaned closer to me, winked, and emphasized, "...a really pretty girl."
Augh! This protective mom (aren't we all, especially those with disabled kids?) isn't quite ready for this. I'm used to the meltdowns, the backtalk, the grumbling and grunts over breakfast. That isn't to say I tolerate those behaviors; I'm just saying I've been through more than my professional colleague had thus far. But girls? This teen of mine, the one with awkward social skills, the one who'll still get himself in detention with his smartmouth ways, isn't ready for girls.
At least, in the fall of this new year, I hope he's not. Because I'm sure not ready for this.
I don't have teenagers, I'm 40 and my kids are 3 and 5. But....I wanted to comment on the "New Year" thing. My New Year starts in August when school starts. That's when you get new underwear, socks, and all kinds of new beauty products. My husband thought I had hit my head the first time he mentioned getting some new shoes in February. I was like "shoes? in February? you get new shoes in August when school starts, not in February?"
Yea, he thought I was nuts!
Posted by: Jerri Ann | October 04, 2008 at 09:14 PM