Month: August 2009

Dude has a good buddy that he’s known since he was about three years old. This friend’s father died when he was a baby, so he’s never had a dad and grew up with just his mother.

Kevin has been his surrogate father throughout the years and has tried to play a positive role in his life.

We used to see this kid every Friday night. The kid’s grandparents are our next door neighbor so yeah, he virtually lived at our house all throughout grade school and middle school.

Now that he’s in high school, is driving his own car and has his own job, we see him a lot less.

He’s a good kid, but he’s a bit on the wild side. I’m assuming it’s because he didn’t have a strong male influence in his life growing up, but wild or no, he really is a good kid.

He just …… happens to FIND trouble.

Case in point: He came over the other night to show us the work he had done on his new car. He’s been ordering parts from the ‘net and rebuilding it as he goes along.

It’s all very impressive and we should absolutely be impressed by this kid. He’s staying out of trouble … for the most part.

But as we’re standing there, oohing and aahing over his handiwork, he starts to tell us a story about how he was at an ice cream joint one night and these guys jumped out of their car, pulled him out of his car and just started beating him up.

Okay. I know this kid pretty well. And though I’m sure he’s telling us the truth, I’m also sure it’s not the ENTIRE truth. That sort of thing just doesn’t happen. I’m sure it probably does in bigger cities, but we’re in po-dunk Springfield, our crime problems just haven’t escalated to that point.

(I hope).

Anyway, the reason I’m telling you this is because Dude is standing there and absorbing all of this and with each dramatic punch these hoodlums are delivering to this friend’s face, Dude’s eyes get bigger and bigger.

I can see he’s been spooked a bit.

After the friend left, I had a little conversation with Dude.

“You know that trouble seems to just follow D around, don’t you? I’m sure there is more to the story.”

Dude grunts.

“You know that when you start driving by yourself, it’s very unlikely a group of guys are going to jump you, right?”

Dude grunts again.

“This sort of thing doesn’t happen on a daily basis. I mean, unless you provoke someone or …”

At this point, I realize I’m burying myself in quick sand and I end my brilliant speech with

“It’s not going to happen to you. Don’t worry about it.”

Yeah, brilliant mom. Way to calm the kid down.

So, fast forward to today.

After the boys got their hair cut, I coaxed Dude into driving up to Best Buy so we could look at some phones. I promised Jazz that when he got to high school, he could have his own cell phone.

Well. Here we are. High school. So, since the phone they have now has a ton of minutes on it and Jazz will most likely be the one who needs his phone more, we decided we’d just buy Dude his own phone and give the old one to Jazz.

Still with me?

Anyway ….

Me and Dude, we’re at Best Buy. And since we go through Virgin Mobile (because we’re a pre-paid minutes sort of family), we looked at Best Buy’s selection of Virgin Mobile phones.

Only, their selection? Is tiny.

So, I suggested to Dude that we just go online and see what they had available (in hindsight, we should have just done that to begin with. When has the internet EVER let me down?).

We’re leaving Best Buy and it’s pouring rain. Of course, I don’t have an umbrella so I try and coax Dude into driving his car up to the building to pick me up.

He refuses.

I insist.

He gets angry.

I get extremely annoyed. After all, I’m not asking the kid to drive cross-country, just across the freaking parking lot! Grr.

So, I tell him to go ahead and unlock the door and I’ll follow him.

He runs ahead and is reaching for his door handle when a man stops him.

I immediately forget about the rain and high tail it over to see what is going on.

Dude looks frozen. And not from cold. He’s stiff and awkward looking and I’m suddenly running various perversions through my mind. My adrenaline starts pumping and I think I could have seriously kicked that man’s ass, I was that prepared to defend my child.

I reach the duo and ask what’s going on.

“My girlfriend left the lights on,” the man says and weakly gestures to his van that is sitting directly in front of Dude’s car. “I was wondering if you could give me a jump.”

I’m certain my chest visibly deflated in relief. He wasn’t a perv, he was just a guy who needed some help.

I gave him an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry. But we don’t have any cables.”

“Oh, that’s okay,” the man replied. “I’ve got some.”

I’m now aware that I have an impressionable teenager hanging on our every word. And we’re all standing in the rain and getting quite soaked. So, I did the only thing a God-fearing person would do in this situation.

“Absolutely. Let me pull the car around.”

I get into the driver’s seat and Dude continues to stand outside, in the rain, looking shell-shocked.

His expression says it all, “What just happened?? Was I just approached by a … by a … strange human?!?”

I tap on the car window to get Dude’s attention and motion for him to get into the car.

I pull the car around and endure awkward moments and dirty looks from other people in the parking lot who can’t figure out why I’m blocking their path while positioning Dude’s car in front of the guy’s van.

By this time, this poor man is completely soaked to the skin. And he looks so apologetic and miserable my heart goes out to him.

He pops the hood (I couldn’t even tell him which side the battery was on – that’s how clueless I am when it comes to cars), he hooks up the cables (and I have a momentary vision of him getting electrocuted because remember? It’s raining), and he quickly gets his van started.

He unhooks the cables and I roll my window down. I didn’t even hear the engine turn over and I’m still not sure, hours later, whether he really DID get his car started or not.

And now I’m a bit suspicious, but I don’t say anything to Dude.

“Do I owe you anything?” The man asks.

“Oh good grief, no,” I answer him back. I give him a little wave and we drive off.

After we got home, Dude and I talked about the incident. He acted so out-of-sorts and freaked out that I assumed it was because he still has this “thing” about wanting to be invisible to the world and OH MY GOSH, people scare the crap out of him. (It’ll be interesting to see how he handles a job).

And though I’m certain his aversion to people was part of the reason he acted so … awkward, he told me that he thought the guy was going to jump him.

Ah. A light bulb went off in my head and the whole friend story came back to me. Of course. He’s now not only wary of people, he might even be a tad afraid of them.

And that’s probably due, in part, to the story his friend just told him.

So, we had another talk about how you need to be cautious in life, but can’t always assume that everyone you meet is out to get you.

I hate that a simple plea for help is treated with suspicion, but at the same time, people need to be cautious. There are a lot of bad people out there and you just never know what someone’s objective is. I’m sure this episode was nothing more than it appeared, but then again, I can’t honestly tell you whether the guy got his engine running because I didn’t see it. And I didn’t hear any slow whir-whir-whirring that an engine makes when it’s run out of juice and being jumped.

But it was raining. And Dude’s car engine is noisy, too. So, I just might have missed it. And maybe the guy’s battery wasn’t stone cold, but just didn’t have enough juice to get the car started and needed that little nudge to do so.

But what if the guy didn’t really need any help at all but targeted Dude because he was young, vulnerable and alone in a semi-deserted parking lot?

Who knows.

It was a strange situation to be in and an even stranger situation to try and teach Dude. On one hand, I don’t want him to be afraid of people, but on the other hand, he definitely needs to be wary, and on guard with people, at the same time.

When Kevin heard the story, he told Dude that if something like that ever happened to him while he was out alone to go with his instinct. If he was uncomfortable with the situation, just tell the guy no and leave. And though that’s sound advice and I CERTAINLY don’t want Dude to be in a dangerous situation, the fact that we HAVE to tell him that makes my heart hurt.

It’s like the whole picking up a stranger thing that Kevin and I went through the other day.

We want to help people out. But there is so much evil in the world that you sometimes have to forgo that urge to be a good Christian, a decent human being, and simply go into survival mode.

It’s sad, isn’t it?

I was in a room full of people, but I never felt more alone.

We attended Jazz’s freshman orientation last week.

It was just me and Jazz. Kevin had band practice so couldn’t go.

Dude simply curled his lip when I asked him if he wanted to tag along. He’s an upper-classman now. He’d rather have his hair cut than hang out with a freshman. (And that, my friends, is saying A LOT).

Jazz didn’t WANT to go.

I made him. It’s a rite of passage. He’ll never be a freshman again (let’s hope, anyway). This would be his last orientation. It was a milestone in his life; I didn’t want him to miss it.

We should have skipped it.

Jazz didn’t want to go because he’d already sat through Dude’s orientation and then he had to sit through the spiel yet again for some band function, so to say we knew what was coming … well, would be to say we knew what was coming.

We knew it would be in the gym. (check)

We knew there would be a PowerPoint presentation. (there was)

We knew it would be a boring PowerPoint presentation. (it was)

We knew it would be incredibly hot (Man, was it ever. My water-proof mascara actually melted off my lashes and plopped onto my light-colored shirt. I was quite annoyed).

We knew there would be a lot of people. (A lot of people, yes. But jammed packed? No.)

We knew that the A+ coordinator would take the longest amount of time and would likely lose most of the audience with her confusing explanations and rules. (She did. And I STILL don’t fully understand how that program works.)

However, what I didn’t know, or anticipate, was the fact that Jazz wouldn’t want anything to do with me.

Ouch.

I tried not to let it hurt my feelings. After all, we’ve reached that part of the road where it’s really uncool to sit with mom. I get it. I suppose I should embrace the fact that he’s ready to be independent of me.

But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that it hurt, just a smidgen, when I tried to get him to sit next to me and he completely ignored me to go sit with his friends.

*sigh*

So. There I sat. Alone and lonely. All by my lonesome. Trying to act interested and yet trying not to appear too world weary in front of the first-time freshman parents.

And trying not to be bored out of my cotton-picking mind.

Instead of listening, I spent my time observing the various people around me, without making it look like, you know, I was staring at them and being all creepy stalker-ish.

No easy feat, let me tell ya.

I observed several emotions: anticipation, eagerness, boredom, apprehension, excitement, confusion, fear, sadness, nostalgia, pride … etc., really, the list goes on. I remember feeling all of those things whenever Dude started high school.

But I didn’t feel any of those things this go-around.

I just felt annoyance.

I wanted the dang thing to be over with. I was ready to move on and get his schedule. I was anxious to find his rooms. I wanted to step back into my son’s needed arena and feel important in his life once again.

I was also annoyed with Kevin.

He could have skipped practice. And to be fair to the man, he was fully prepared to skip it. But Jazz insisted that it was okay. That it was no big deal. That he didn’t really care if he was there or not.

But was it? A big deal, I mean. I don’t want to deliberately down play these milestones in Jazz’s life just because we’ve been through them already with Dude. These milestones were old news to us, but they were new and exciting to Jazz.

I just don’t want Jazz to grow up and look back on this period in his life and regret the fact that Kevin and I were so blasé about the big stuff in his life.

He says he doesn’t care now? But what will he tell his therapist years from now? (I’m kidding … I hope).

So, I was a bit annoyed that Kevin wasn’t there. I wasn’t annoyed that he missed the introductions and the RAH RAH GO FRESHMEN speech, but that he was going to miss the awkward trying to find classes thing. There’s always a memory or two to be had from that experience and this time around was no exception.

Where was I …

Oh yeah. Orientation was over and like cattle, we shuffled our way to the various tables they had set up in the hallways. We passed the PTSA table, the table jammed packed with t-shirts that read “Fear the Poo” and “What happens at (name of school) stays at (name of school)”. We all squeezed into the cafeteria and upon our exit, encountered all of the club tables. Once we cleared the clubs, we came across the sports’ tables (yawn) until we finally pooled into the administration portion of the building where they had about ten tables crammed into about a 12 x 12 space.

Aargh! It was already hot in the building. And I was feeling faint from people’s body odor to begin with, it only magnified when I reached this section.

To top it off, the lines curled into each other. So, the schedule line literally ran THROUGH the locker line. So, people were beyond confused. And I got stuck behind a dude who was as big as I was and periodically stepped on my toes (accidentally — or was it??) so by the time we finally reached the woman handing out schedules, my entire foot was dead.

They had divided the schedules up into two sections:

A – L section was this table.

M – Z section was that table.

And there was only ONE person manning each table.

Aargh! Do you KNOW how long that took?? When there were about 400 students waiting to pick up their schedules? I’d say about 30 minutes, if I had been keeping track of the time and not keeping my eye on the toe-stomping guy in front of me.

Finally, FINALLY, we reached the woman and Jazz asked for his schedule.

And the woman looked through her stack of papers and couldn’t find it.

I went postal and starting thrashing about like a wild, insane monkey and Jazz died of embarrassment and disowned me right there and then.

Okay, not really. I was just seeing if you were paying attention.

The woman’s lips curled into a feral snarl as she handed over his schedule and then she roughly pushed us out of the way and snapped at us like a rabid dog. I was quite alarmed and not just a bit scared of her wicked, and very sharp-looking teeth. (I think there was spittle involved, but I can’t be sure. Everything happened so fast).

Okay, not really. But Jazz DID finally get his schedule and we promptly moved out of the chaos to make room for the people behind us.

And in all seriousness, THAT was one of the biggest reasons the place was like a human sardine can: kids and parents got their schedules and then just stood, in the middle of the freaking room, and effectively blocked an already convoluted mess. I really did feel like screaming at them to move their butts.

Honestly, some people are so clueless.

Jazz and I then walked around the school to locate his classes. He had one class upstairs, in the new science wing, but the powers that be had the upper level blocked off so we didn’t find his first class, and his study hall room was a bit of a challenge to locate (unlike the other rooms that had their numbers prominently displayed on nice plaques outside their door, his study hall room had the room number etched into the wood above the door, in ball point ink. WTH?). But other than that, no problem. We were good to go.

We didn’t stick around long enough to get a locker.

1. Because we didn’t feel like navigating the insane crowd again.

2. The school requires that you have your locker mate PRESENT whenever you sign up for a locker. And considering Dude and Jazz were planning on sharing a locker and there was no way in Hades you would catch Dude at a freshman event, I knew there would be trouble trying to get one, so we didn’t even try.

*mumblemumble-stupid rule-mumblemumble*

So, Dude and I went back to the school the next day and they gave him a locker to share with Jazz. WHY they couldn’t do that the previous day is beyond my feeble comprehension. I’m sure there’s a reason for it …. forget it. It’s a stupid rule, no matter how you look at it.

So, Jazz is now officially ready to begin his freshman year in high school. I can’t believe we’re reached this point. I’ve been laughingly referring to the “day I have both boys in high school” for years and *POOF*, suddenly, here we are.

School begins next Tuesday. So in the meantime, I still have one full week with my boys.

And I will smother them with so much love and attention they will be begging to go back to school.

Heh

So, Karen. How’s the whole teaching your 16-year old son how to drive thing coming along?

Well I’ll tell ya …..

We’re driving, but not as much as I’d like to. Every time I mention going out to drive, Dude makes a sound somewhere between the Argh/Blah/Gah sound. In fact, it’s become a family joke.

“Hey Kevin, want a cookie?”

“Argh/Blah/Gah”

“Hey Jazz, want a Root Beer?”

“Argh/Blah/Gah”

“Hey mom. Feel like going for ice cream?”

“Argh/Blah/Gah”

“Hey Dude. Let’s go driving for a bit.”

“Argh/Blah/Gah”

Did I mention that I get his patented drop-dead look, too? No? The kid has a LETHAL death stare. Seriously. I have burn marks to prove it.

I have to laugh at this kid because if I don’t laugh? I’ll strangle him. What kind of 16-year boy doesn’t WANT to drive? What sort of 16-year old boy doesn’t WANT to be independent from his over-bearing, sometimes b*tchy mother??

My boy, apparently. *sigh*

I don’t get this kid. Every other boy I have EVER known (well, mostly) couldn’t wait to get his grubby hands on a driver’s license. Or better yet, have his OWN set of wheels to drive around in. (Well, technically, the car isn’t HIS yet, he still needs to pay us for half of it. But you know what I mean).

He’s got cousins that are younger than him driving. He’s got another cousin of his that went on a cross-country trip with one of his buddies. He’s got a friend who is not only driving his THIRD car (long story), he’s ordering body parts from the Internet and rebuilding a heap of junk into a really cool car. This same friend also got a job at Jiffy Lube and is now signed up to do an internship, through school, at a mechanic’s garage because he’s thinking of doing that for a career. (Cha-ching! Do you know how much mechanics get paid?! Smart kid).

I have an odd son.

In fact, I’m sort of THANKFUL that he’s not that into driving right now. After all, that’s one less headache I have to deal with at the moment.

But that’s okay. I’ll take him anyway. Cause I love him – oddities and all. I can’t expect him to be like everyone else. He’ll fall into his own in his own sweet time. I try not to compare him to his peers, but it’s hard not to, I suppose. I guess I can’t really relate to his reluctance to be independent because even though I wasn’t really interested in driving until I was about 17, once I got my car, all hell broke loose. Just ask my parents. 🙂

But the freedom bug? Will bite soon. Very, very soon. I just have a feeling. I shouldn’t rush things. It’ll happen and then I’ll be all, “WHY was I in such a hurry to get him behind the wheel of a car again??”

The kid is doing well. He’s a natural born driver. Heck, he’s a better driver than I am. (And I’m pretty good, thank you very much. In fact, if Danica Patrick wasn’t already driving in the Indy races, I’d totally be THE first woman, or one of the first, to drive in the racing circuit.)

That’s how GOOD I am. *humpf*

But Dude? Well, he just might be a better driver than me.

At least, he’s getting there. Now, I’m not saying we didn’t have our rough patches. For instance, did I tell you about the clueless tourist who shoved us out of our lane because he got confused and suddenly forgot he wasn’t the only driver on the road?

We were coming home from a lunch date with Kevin. The kid drove me and him to Kevin’s work and with Kevin squished into the back seat, he then drove us both to a Chinese restaurant for lunch.

(It was a great lunch, by the way. It was weird not having Jazz with us [he was at band camp], but really nice to have some one-on-one time with just Dude).

He drove like a pro. Kevin later told me that he was a little nervous about his turning, but honestly? I think his turning is coming along nicely. He’s been working on making his turns smooth so he doesn’t give his passengers whiplash from the jerky movements. (Unlike someone else I know *cough Kevin cough*)

He dropped Kevin back off at work and we were on our way home. There is a confusing section of road that branches off into the on ramp for a stretch of highway; it’s confusing to ME, and I’m a local. So, yeah, I can totally see how someone would not know what to do with that bit of road. (Why they made it like that is beyond my comprehension).

We were in the far inside lane because I’ve seen enough drivers get confused at this intersection and make some incredibly stupid decisions that I was hoping we would avoid dealing with anything like that.

Nope. It happened.

The driver of a large 4×4 pickup truck got into the wrong lane. I’m not sure where he thought he was going, but he tried to turn where he wasn’t supposed to and suddenly swerved into our lane. He never looked, he didn’t even slow down.

Jerk.

I took a breath and went into survival mode. (I don’t panic in emergency situations like that – I tend to get really focused and react quickly). I reached over to press Dude’s horn at the guy, to

A. let him know we were there and please don’t run us over, thank you very much.

B. Because I was annoyed at the clueless guy and he deserved a good, hard honk.

But, nothing happened. The horn sputtered and squawked, sort of like an injured whale, and was completely ineffective.

Luckily, Dude had been watching the guy and had anticipated the mistake. He smoothly changed lanes and narrowly missed side-swiping the guy.

Suddenly, I was grateful for all of my “anticipate the drivers’ moves around you and always have a plan B” speeches. We, HE, avoided an accident. I was very proud of him.

But other than that little snafu, Dude really has been doing a good job.

(Kevin replaced his horn over the weekend. Apparently, the thing got some water in it and it just sort of died).

I’ve been pretty relaxed throughout this whole process, if you want the truth. I think I’ve been okay with this driving thing because we bought him a used car to practice in. A car, that if he happened to put a dent into it, I wouldn’t totally lose my cool over. And we did that because I was afraid I’d be too nervous and uptight with him driving my car (which is only a few years old), and totally ruin any chance for him to develop any sort of driving confidence. I can totally understand why some parents would feel uncomfortable and nervous allowing their kids to learn how to drive in their primary car.

It’s nerve wracking, I know. But speaking as a mother of a driving teen? Just take it slow. Start in a parking lot. Then graduate to side streets. Then move to busier streets. Then drive in the rain. Then drive a bit at night. And lastly, take them on the highway.

Whatever you do, don’t take them out on the highway FIRST. You’ll have a heart attack.

Speaking of night driving, we need to do more of that. I think I’ve only taken him out once at night. Perspectives change at night, so it’s important for him to get some practice on that.

Kevin took him out over the weekend to practice parallel parking. But first, he pulled up some Youtube videos on how to parallel park on the kitchen computer and we watched them over lunch.

Hey, don’t laugh, they helped. A lot.

Kevin took him to an empty parking lot. He set up a microphone stand and a music stand to mark the points and then allowed Dude to start practicing. In fact, he taped his first attempt.

As you can see, he NAILED it, the first time. Yes, we’ll work on his spacing later.

I think Kevin is planning on taking him to a quiet street next weekend so they can actually practice between two cars. *gulp*

We don’t talk to Dude while we’re driving. We simply give him instructions on where to turn, etc. The radio is off and I don’t even answer my cell phone when it rings — we don’t want the kid to lose concentration. We’d like him to get comfortable with the mechanics of driving first before introducing any sort of distractions into the equation.

I realize that time is coming. I just hope that when it comes, he’s a good enough driver that his gross motor skills outweigh his sensory perception skills.

Since Dude is under 18, he’s required to have 40 hours of driving and six months from his permit date to try for his license. His six months will be over at the end of September, and though he’s getting close to 40 hours, we’re not quite there yet.

So, he should be ready to try for his license when it’s time, provided he FEELS ready. We’ll see how it goes.

I should totally get paid to be a driving instructor.