I'm really not sure what is worse, the home improvement adventures or the parenting adventures of my new teenager. Either way, both have produced massive amounts of grey hair that I can't convince myself is really "sun-bleached".
Since March, my son has morphed into a completely unknown individual of 5'4" and 120 pounds of insensitivity, lack of communication, non-listening mass of a being. I would like to say he has been taken over by an alien, but I can't even say that as his mannerisms have remained similar but with more attitude and less emotion and compassion. My son is becoming...a man. Sigh...
I ask very little of my son. VERY. LITTLE.
I do expect respect, honesty and communication. I expect that he will be morally and ethically humane. That he will have both sympathetic and empathetic qualities. I expect that he will always love me, even when he doesn't like me and most of all that he will listen AND hear me, not just stare at me blankly while he imagines dancing girls, You Tube videos and if he will get a hit during his next game! I also expect that he will make his bed daily, clean his room on occasion and bring his dirty dishes to the kitchen. And honestly, I really don't harp on him for the later three things.
On the 3rd of July, in the midst of my painting adventures of the basement bathroom and den, there was the local festivities happening in town. I asked if my son wanted to go, which he did, at 9:30p.m. So we headed downtown to see the fireworks. As we walked to the park, I became the motherly plague. No longer could he be seen walking with me or next to me. Nope. He scurried ahead or shuffled his feet twenty feet behind me, with his head slouched and his hands deeply immersed in his pockets. We had time to kill after walking around a bit so I suggested he could walk around for a bit and then he needed to come back.
In his defense, I did not give him a time frame. Ten minutes pass. Twenty minutes. Thirty minutes. Forty-five minutes. By this time, I'm silently clenching inside, worrying about the thousands of people, wondering if he's been kidnapped or ran off with the nearest gang all the while combating those thoughts with allowing him the freedom and responsibility to Do the right thing. Sixty-five minutes later, and after the first fireworks began, he calls me. He tells me where he is. I inquire if he's staying there to watch the fireworks. "Yeah." End of conversation.
I stand there, where I have been for now almost 1.5 hours by myself to watch the fireworks by myself. I could have been at home painting. I could have been anywhere. But there I stood...where he had parted from me, standing alone, watching fireworks.
After the show completes, he doesn't arrive. I look at my phone and I have missed two phone calls from him. I call him back and he tells me that I can meet him at a distant vendor. NO. You will meet me where you left me in TWO MINUTES.
He arrives. I'm FURIOUS. I talk to him about safety, responsibility and communication. I tell him he is grounded. If he can master communicating on Facebook, he can put his skills into practice in real life without his computer for a day or two. No racetrack the next day. If I hadn't promised a friend to go out on her boat the next day, would have cancelled that too. Icing on that cake, the mother of one of the boys he was sitting there calls to see if he found me as he "just took off". So he not only worried me, he worried her by not communicating. And never once did he mention that the mother was there and I could go join them. He went without his computer for a week. Not because I didn't want him to have it, but because he never asked and I never offered.
I can say that his communication hasn't gotten better; however, he is living on his computer and Facebook a lot less these days!
Fast forward to two nights ago. I informed him that I wanted him to pull weeds the following day, yesterday. He told me to wake him in the morning before work to point out what were weeds. I had no interest in doing so at 8:00a.m., so I told him I would show him then, at 11:00p.m. at night. I pointed out the weeds while he used the blue light.
Yesterday he called me at work. "Hey mom, I'm pulling weeds. Is this green thing a weed?"
I get that I'm a mom that may have some bionic powers, but what thing is a green thing? I tell him not to pull out anything that he doesn't know. I confirm that around the side were the weeds I had shown him the night before and to pull those. He called me an hour later to say he was done and asked if he could head to the park. OK.
I came home yesterday and something was in the yard. He had left the box of garbage bags on the lawn. I went to pick them up and to my surprise...half of my plants...WERE GONE.
Not only had he pulled weeds and a majority of the grass growing in the flower bed, he pulled out a large perennial ground cover that was about 2.5'round! In addition, he pulled out all the vinca AND he tore out my 4' tall DAYLILLIES. Seriously?
The daylillies were almost in full bloom. I had just purchased two gallon containers of them for the side yard. He saw them for days before they were planted. How could he not notice the large daylilly buds? How could he remotely believe that they were weeds? In tearing them out, he destroyed the root system. I was able to replant one stalk and maybe it will come back. I had him replant the large ground cover.
Why do I feel that his actions are half-assed in attempt to not have to do anything EVER again?
It's clearly working though, because the battle just isn't worth it, neither is the damage. I realize I do this with every aspect and relationship of my life. If I ask for help and someone fails at doing it correctly, not even MY WAY, I would rather just endure doing it myself when I can find the time than to ask, again.
Then...there was the water. I forgot that I had turned on the sprinkler on the new side yard to water the newly growing grass seed and our replanted plants in the front. We left the house and I took my son to his evening adventure (when he wasn't suppose to be with me!) while I headed to dinner and the theater.
I came home and my son was fast asleep on his couch in the basement with the television on. Immediately I noticed small streams of water streaming down the cement wall, the newly painted cement wall! I cleaned up the wall and the water continued. I heard the sprinkler on. It had been on for six hours! He never noticed the water. He didn't hear the sprinkler and turn it off, nothing. The neighbors didn't turn it off either after it had been watering their driveway for six hours! So I shut off the hose and continued to clean up the water. One area had been streaming in from the old window well glass block window screen that I had left open. The other area, I have no idea. Having the sprinkler wedged up against the house with constant water for six hours, not a good thing! The small amount of water was cleaned up. The wall was wiped down and the water marks are gone. The fan went all night long and has dried everything up.
No damage done...today. Ah, can't wait for the adventures of tomorrow! How many years left until he graduates and moves on to college? Let me count the days...
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