Lately, as in today, I have noticed how talented my teen is at maternal put-downs. This is not news to me. She has been a teen for four years now, and before that she was a sassy kid. But the volume seems to have been turned up. Maybe because her boyfriend has gone away for three months, so we’re spending lots of time together. And I am, as you may recall, a very annoying person.
The first moment came when I was expressing an opinion I happened to have. Mom, she said, do your thinking inside your head. Perhaps I was rambling a little in the expression of the opinion. But can it have been all that terrible to hear? Apparently so.
Later, I was online perusing jackets I don’t need and came upon a really cool looking one. I showed it to my teen. Isn’t that cool? I mistakenly said. Yeah, she said, doing that thing with one eye that says Hell No. If you want to look like a conquistador. She fumbled conquistador in such a way that told me she didn’t know what the hell it was. I challenged her. She admitted to having no idea. It’s one of those Spanish types, I told her, who killed all the Aztecs and Incas in the 1500s. She smiled triumphantly. Well exactly! And there I was, foolishly impressed by a jacket that would make me look like a marauding genocidal 16th century Spaniard. Why is it so hard to win against a seventeen year old who doesn’t even know her history?
Later still, we were both sitting on the couch. She was watching a movie and I was texting. I decided to try something, just for a laugh. Switch out that lamp on the kitchen table, would you? I said. It’s shining in my eyes. And while you’re up, will you get my book from beside my bed? She looked up from her movie. Her look said, you’re kidding, right? Then her mouth said it. You’re kidding, right?
I was not kidding. As I patiently reminded her, there have been many many instances of her asking me to get things that are actually closer to her than they are to me. Or bring something in to her in her bedroom where she is sprawled on the bed doing nothing, even though I am working at the kitchen table. Or get something from a faraway place - not even in the house, sometimes. She did not recall any of these events.
She went back to her movie. Apparently our short discussion of things beyond her recall had also erased her memory of my request. After a few minutes, I mentioned wistfully that I was really yearning for chocolate, but we didn’t have any. I admit, this was duplicitous of me, as I happened to know she has a Toblerone in her room. But the thing is, it’s dark chocolate and I only like milk chocolate. The 7-11 near our house has lots of milk chocolate. I mentioned this. I’ll go to 7-11, she said, still watching her movie. I’m not beyond running errands.
Ten minutes went by. Half an hour. I was absorbed in my book by then, the book I had fetched right after I turned the lamp out. She was absorbed in her movie. The chocolate stayed at 7-11. In the end, this is a good thing, because I am addicted to chocolate and would probably have eaten way more than a normal person should eat. Plus it was pretty nice just being on the couch together.
You could say I have poor parenting boundaries, but that would make me sound weak and ineffective, so I prefer to think of it as picking my battles. She did cook me dinner while I was working, my teen, and it was completely delicious. I had to get up from the couch and physically show her the pasta that was sitting staring at her in our pantry. Then I had to identify that the mushrooms in a container she found in the fridge were indeed the mushrooms that I had said were in the fridge. But having dinner cooked for me is sort of icing on the parenting cake. The lamp and book thing was just a wild experiment: I didn’t really expect it to work. Sort of like when you buy a lottery ticket. And when I examine things closely, I realize that I already won the lottery. What are the odds of winning it twice?!
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