So, as a public service to you all, here are a few of our "issues:"
1) Son #2: Mom, are we out of bread?
Me: Yes.
Son #2: Mom! Even criminals get bread everyday!
Me (thinking to myself): Problem solved, go live with them.
Me (out loud): Sorry. I think there are some pizza rolls left.
Update: I bought a loaf of bread, so Son #2 will not starve, or be forced to join a band of criminals to find nourishment.
Son #2
2) Son #1 started summer band today. This rudely interrupted our waking up at 10:00am summer schedule, since he had to be at the band hall at 8:30. So around 7:30am he and I tried to load his sousaphone into my car. This thing is heavy, and when it's in the case, is about the size of a baby elephant. We got it in the car, but the back hatch barely closed, so I had fears of driving down the highway at 70 mph and launching a baby elephant sized torpedo at the car behind us.
When I went to pick him up at 4:00, he was whining and walking like the Hunchback of Notre Dame. The first few weeks of marching band are apparently hard on his shoulder. I only mention this because: Son #1 is over 6 feet tall, very solidly built (not fat at all, very muscular) and his section leader is a girl that is very thin and about a foot shorter than him. She looked like she was ready to do another 4 hours of band, no hunchback, no whining. Girls Rule!
Son #1
3) My husband and I have a standing bi weekly argument. He seems to wait until I am on the road going somewhere and then calls me and "reminds" me to buy lottery tickets. Ok, not a huge issue, but here's the problem. I think that buying more than one lottery ticket at a time for the same drawing is pessimistic, so I always buy one ticket per drawing. He insists on five tickets per drawing, and cannot be persuaded to change his ways. Grrrrr....
4) I had this idea the other day and I thought it would make a really good book. I told the boys about it and they ran with it and had some really great ideas, then...somehow Son #2 and I got in this heated debate on the merits of Language Arts class. Not sure how we got there, but he seems to think that after 8 years of Language Arts (he's going into 9th grade), and the fact that he reads A LOT, he knows all there is to know and could write the Great American Novel right now, if he wanted to. I said, "I think not," and he was highly offended. Oh, this child!! I love him dearly, and he is brilliant and creative, but he thinks he knows it all at 14 years old. There is a fine line between pumping up their confidence and self esteem and crushing their dreams with my disbelieving laughter at their misplaced superiority and arrogance.
Oh yeah, and for some reason my house smells like stinky feet and sweaty boys today. Is raising girls any easier?
Help!
Jen
Boys are beyond the range of anybody's sure understanding, at least when they are between the ages of 18 months and 90 years. - James Thurber
