Archive for the ‘Teenagers’ Category:
I worried about my kids when I was pregnant…
but at least I knew where they were!
Prepare yourself. When you have a high school senior who drives, you don’t always know where he is. The maternal GPS that guides us through many years fails to function when kids hit a certain age. And prepare yourself again. When you trust them, you get used to it.
I’m currently pacing myself with the ‘Where r u?’ texts. And there are many times that my seventeen-year-old son calls or texts with his location (sometimes when he doesn’t even need money) before I get to him. I figure that if in fourteen months he’s going to go away to college that I better get comfy not always knowing where he is or what he’s doing, and that he needs to be comfortable with it too. I remember not that many years ago when he called me every hour when he was gone with friends. After a while I told him he didn’t have to call me - unless he wanted to - or unless he was changing locations - even if he was walking — which was his modus transportationi until he was sixteen. Then we got to the point where he was asking permission only if he wanted to out of our little two-town area. Now, he tells me where he’s going or he tells me when he gets there. Permission comes into play when curfew is in question or if he has people to our house, if he wants to miss dinner. Or if he wants to sleep out.
Which is what he did last night. At a friend’s whom I know well. The mom is one of my closest friends. And she was away. Overnight.
Three boys and a dog sleeping in a house without an adult - with neighbors (pre-planned) ringing the doorbell to check on them walk the dog. There are multiple emergency exits doors and plenty of smoke detectors. And I am just a minute away.
So I agreed.
I think he was shocked, because I did not allow him to stay alone overnight in May when I went away for the weekend. The mean mom that I am forced him to come into Chicago for the night, stay at a friend’s loft with two other teenager boys and my friend’s husband and then join us for a five-star brunch the next morning at the Park Hyatt. I know. I’m awful.
But this time it worked for me. Maybe because it wasn’t my good time that would up for grabs wondering what was going on and not being nearby. Last night was the same as any other around here except I didn’t have to wake up when he came in to say good-night. I did my motherly text…and in doing so I wanted him to realize and maybe appreciate that if he wanted to come home that was OK with me I trust him.
“Call if you need anything or in the morning.”
“Yep love u goodnight.”
And with that, I slept like a rock and didn’t worry at all.
I could make excuses but I won’t
I could come up with a lot of reasons I have a new cell phone — a fancy, do-everything-but-the-dishes, touch it — heck — just look at it and it knows-what-you-want cell phone. I could say that my contract was up, which it was. I could say that the last time I got a cell phone — a blue flip phone - was a month before the last BlogHer conference in Chicago in 2007, which it was. I could say I got headaches and sore thumbs from pushing the seven-key four times every time I needed an “s” in a text message, not to mention the endless loop of button-pushing involved if I whizzed past the # or the $ or the @.
I could say that I needed my phone to pinpoint with Big Brother accuracy my exact location on my living room couch and that I was in desperate need of knowing the time and weather in cities around the world while I’m walking around the grocery store. I could say I was longing to Tweet from the parking lot while I waited for my fourteen-year-old to come out of the movies or that responding to comments on my Facebook page while I watered the flowers made me a much better “friend.”
iCould but iWon’t.
The truth is…I wanted the cell phone of the future because the future is now. I’m not sure when I last bought something I didn’t need and just wanted that was frivolous and fun, technologic and hip. (Do people say ‘hip’ anymore?) I’m not only enthralled by the idea of listening to podcasts by my favorite authors as I work out on an old-fashioned, do-it-yourself eliptical trainer, but the fact that the regular calculator becomes a scientific calculator when you turn the phone sideways is really going to come in handy when I am making fat-free banana muffins from a box.
Having a cell phone like this means I can send emails from my bed instead of my office - and that everyone will know I’m sending them from my phone because the phone tells them with its icons and “sent from” messages. I quickly learned how to change that message and find I’m glad that the GPS and email are not linked — because I’m sure some people send notes from places we really don’t need to know about. Not that I would ever do that.
The new cell has become a conversation starter for me and my two teenagers — which games to download (the free ones), how to adjust the volume and of course, when they can get one too, as to not be left behind. It’s a way to track my eating and my spending and most importantly, the vehicle through which I throw virtual balls of paper into a make-believe trash can with a finger flick (darned fan!). It has also made my Mom-Texts much cuter to look at, because “Where r u?” and “Where R U?” and “WHERE R U?” and “When is the movie over I’ve been out here for 20 minutes” all look absolutely adorable in little green on-screen dialogue bubbles.
Fact is, keeping up with the technological Joneses is something I don’t often do as it’s usually beyond the reach of my wallet.
Much to my son’s chagrin we have nary a wide, flat, big screen TV or HDTV or Tivo or DVR or a pool table (that’s a different post). I have a DVD player I’ve forgotten how to use and a VCR just in case I ever need it. Our TVs are fat, not slim and sleek, and although they are plenty - they are also plenty old.
I’m enjoying my stint on the almost-cutting-edge — with my neon green case and my special cloth for cleaning. My time at the top will be fleeting, this is something I know for sure, because as everyone else gets things newer and shinier, I’ll be happy enough with what I have because it’s mine — as always.
Although I wouldn’t complain if there was an App that folded laundry.
Sleeping through curfew
I woke and looked at the clock. 2:30 a.m. The dogs followed me to the bathroom. Had I dreamed that my son mumbled “Nite, Mom” or “Hi, Mom” hours before? Had I responded? Or was that the day before? I’m a sound sleeper but usually wake at the lightest footstep, toilet flush, groan or whimper. I was disoriented. I remembered, but not really.
I made a decision about six weeks ago to go to sleep before my son’s curfew. Meaning, I go to sleep while my son is still out. We live in a small town that’s next to a bigger small town. There’s no place to go - especially after 9pm because nothing is open. So if he’s not here with his friends playing video games in the basement, he’s in someone else’s house playing video games or pool or watching TV. I’m not concerned about long, late night drives or cruising the mall. There is no mall. He knows when he has to be home, and in over a year of driving he has missed curfew only twice - both times I was actually impressed with his creative reasoning — knowing that is all part of being a teenager. And when you have a really good kid — and I do — you have to pick your battles as carefully as when you don’t have a good kid, and not freak out when they go outside the lines they usually stay within.
I knew I could not go through an entire summer waiting up for him until midnight. I like to go to sleep at 10. Or 11, the latest. And when I get into bed and my head hits the pillow, I’m out. But I always wake up when he gets in — sometimes right before curfew and I pretend I’m asleep as he pokes his head in my bedroom door to tell me he’s home. Then I fall back to sleep, more soundly than before.
But not last night.
Last night I slept through curfew.
The dogs followed me down the hall to my son’s room. It was dark. Darker than usual since he’s fallen asleep with the TV on since he was little. The TV was off. Though I saw the glow of the cell phone by the side of his bed, I wasn’t convinced. But, not only do you not wake a sleeping baby, you do not wake a sleeping seventeen-year-old. I also knew if I ventured further the dogs would help me by jumping on his bed letting me know for sure, through his screams, that he was indeed, safe and sound and sleeping. So I turned heels and walked to the laundry room and door leading to the garage. I opened the door a bit, keeping the dogs behind me with a foot shake and a shh. I pressed the light button.
Two cars. His and mine.
It was much easier when I just peeked into the crib to make sure he was breathing!
* * *
This month, in my Imperfect Parent column, I’m writing about the blogosphere’s Promo-Moms.
