Monday, October 25, 2010

It Takes A Licking And Keeps On Ticking

I've discovered that my heart can be broken, mended, and broken again many, many times by my children. Before my boys became teenagers, someone told me that they would turn into creatures from an alternate universe. Creatures that looked and sounded like my children, but could rotate their heads 360 degrees and shoot fire out of their eyes and venom from their mouths. I was led to believe that this transformation would happen fairly soon upon entering their teenage years. Whoever that someone was.....they lied to me.  This doesn't happen right away; oh, no. It sneaks up on you, just as you're preparing to pat yourself on the back for having escaped fairly unscathed.

The Teenager, when he actually became a teenager, was very mellow and laid back. We did have our moments, but for the most part he was still very much the loving little boy he'd always been to me. Until now, his senior year, when he's preparing to head off into the great unknown called Adulthood. Now?  I'm never quite sure who will be participating in the conversation we're having....the darling little boy who thought I hung the moon, or the ridiculously hostile hormonal mess that resents the very air I breathe if it happens to be air he's breathing at the same time. We've even seen both of these people in the same conversation. I never know at what point I've pushed the conversation too far. And lest you think the switch is caused by arguments, or just telling him no; his head has rotated on his shoulders, fire has come blasting out of his eyes and poisonous, hurtful venom has come spewing out of his mouth with no warning whatsoever in a conversation where we've been laughing and getting along perfectly.

There is no way to predict this. I'm currently in the market, though, for good, solid "Teenager Insurance". Or a flattering flak jacket. Either way, I'll be better protected. Maybe. Because I can't seem to stop myself from talking to him, and trying to hoard every last possible second of time with him before he grows up.

What really amazes me, though, is MY level of forgetfulness. I can be hurt beyond reason by something he says to me, literally brought to tears, and yet.....when he comes out of his cave and sits next to me on the sofa, laying his head on my shoulder and smiling up at me with his beautiful golden lion's eyes, it's like it never even happened. He couldn't possibly have told me that I was his current problem and that everything would be fine if I would just Go Away.

I'm betting that whoever designed the Timex watch was a mother of a teenager.

6 comments:

Rockin Austin said...

See what I mean??? Amazing.

Big Mark 243 said...

A Mother's love is like no other...

Karen said...

Dadgum you, I don't need to hear this kind of stuff. If you need me, I'll be rocking in the corner in a fetal position.

Flea said...

It's like giving birth, isn't it? The most painful thing in the world, but once it's over, totally forgotten and in love. I don't get it.

Shosh said...

I have one girl, and she's 13 now. The first teenager. She's going to be followed by 4 boys...and the oldest one of the boy bunch is 11.

Should I start getting a collection of Timex now?

BTW, if you find that teenager insurance, I'm in.

Iqra said...

I totally know what you're talking about. I can't wait for my brother to get over his hormones :P I don't know why boys take so much time to grow out of the flamethrower stage. I just hope he doesn't stay stuck in this mode forever.

Great title :)