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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
I am his mother. We snigger impatiently, we sigh, grip our foreheads, and sometimes we fight.
Jan 17, 2003 | Sam and I are going through hormonal transformations together, and the house gets crowded. There is Sam at 13 -- usually mellow, funny, slightly nuts. But when the plates suddenly shift, there is The Visitor, the Other. I call him Phil. Phil is a little tense. Also, sullen and contemptuous. There is me at 48 -- usually mellow, funny, and slightly nuts; and there is the Menopausal Death Crone.
Some days are great, because Sam and I at these ages are both wild and hilarious and utterly full of our best stuff; but other days, when Phil and the Death Crone drop by, are awful. We snigger impatiently, and we sigh, grip our foreheads, and we fight. Mostly we fight about homework and church, neither of which work for him -- but by the same token, neither does flossing. It's hard for him to sit still for school and church when he'd rather be playing, or on the computer, and I hate to make him, because I want him to be happy, and to find an authentic spirituality; but mostly I hate to make him because his resistance pollutes my home and my worship.
The usual things help: a little distance, prayer, chocolate. Talking to the parents of older kids is helpful, because parents of kids the same age won't admit how horrible their children are. There's a great book on adolescence that I can turn to, called "Get Out Of My Life, But First Could You Drive Me and Cheryl To the Mall," by Anthony Wolf. I tape things to the wall that give me some light to see by: One pink card says, Breathe, Pray, Be Kind, Stop Grabbing. One says something I heard recently, that you can either practice being right, or practice being kind. Screaming in the car helps.
But what helps most of all is walking. I have been going up on the mountain to walk and be quiet and pray nearly every morning for two years now. I started to do this because I had always heard that this is what Jesus did, although my priest friend Tom has recently corrected me. He said we are not sure if this is actually what Jesus did. He said they had to explain his going away by saying he was going up to the mountain to pray, but for all we know, he went off and had a few beers. Then he may have gone bowling, slinging the ball bitterly down the alley until he felt better.
"What would he have done with 13-year-olds?" I asked.
"In Bible times, they used to stone a few 13-year-olds with some regularity, which helped keep the others quiet and at home. The mothers were usually in the first row of stone throwers, and had to be restrained."
I wrote this down and taped it to my wall, next to the pink card. Every parent who saw it laughed and felt better; nothing helps like letting your ugly, common secrets out. And it came in handy during a recent fight.
That Saturday, I was driving Sam to his friend Anthony's house, where he was going to spend the night. I would pick him up for church at 10:30 the next morning. He was furious about having to go to church, although he only has to go every other week. We had had the Visitor, Phil, with us all morning, petulant and put-upon -- what we used to call "bratty" when I was young. For instance, when I'd asked him to wash his breakfast dishes, you'd have thought I'd ordered him to give the kitty a flea dip. When I'd asked him to take out the garbage, it might have been the bodies of his dead comrades.
I didn't try to get him to want to come to church; I didn't try to bribe him, or get him to like it -- or me. I am not here to be his friend. He was awful in the car, mute and victimized. What a horrible life -- Yugoslavia, under Milosevic.
