The Curious Case of the Phone Call in the Afternoon

Monday, June 22, 2009

I have a theory about college age kids. Ready?

THEY’RE NOT KIDS ANYMORE.

Eighteen-year-olds are adults. They are, at the age of eighteen, responsible for themselves in the eyes of the law, and in the eyes of the MOTHER.

Mom and Dad pay for college, as long as we can afford it, and as long as the child maintains 15 hours a semester and a 3.0 GPA.

But everything else? That’s on them. We expect them to be capable of running their own lives. Basically, we toss them out of the nest and hope they can fly.

When I dropped the Engineer off at Georgia Tech, I pretty much threw him out of the car and waved goodbye. I’m not even sure I slowed down.

But the Engineer was a different kid. He had done a lot of things on his own. He had been to Spain for a summer. He was fairly put together.

The Grouch, however, lives in his computer. He has no experience in the real world. He has never been anywhere. He has never done anything.

Which might explain that deer-in-the-headlights look on his face when we tucked him into his apartment and left.

Over the past two weeks, I have dealt with emails and phone calls asking stupid, mundane, day to day stuff.

The day before yesterday, I had five emails and three frantic phone calls, followed by an AIM chat on the Engineers computer, because I wasn’t answering anymore, so he went to older brother. He was getting ready to register for fall classes, and couldn’t find his AP scores or his final transcript from high school.

And being the great, kind, caring mother that I am, the first thing I said was, “What do you want ME to do about it?”

After a whole day of this, I eventually lost my cool and just did it myself. Yes, I did. It was purely self-preservation. I was tired of being interrupted every five seconds, and YES, I know it was WRONG.

I did tell him it was the last time.

So the next day, when the call came, I was loaded for bear.

I only took a half-hearted glance at the caller ID. It said, “out of area.” Area code started with a 2 .

Dallas.

When the voice said, “Mom,” I was waiting for the shoe to drop.

It did.

“When can I come home?”

Wow. I knew he was having a problem coping with stuff, but I had NO idea that he would be SO irresponsible as to leave school in the middle of an eight week session.

So I did what any rational, reasonable mother would do. I railed him out. I talked about responsibility. I carried on about character. I told him to suck it up, damn it.

After a minute or two, a very confused voice said, “Mom, I know you said you’d pick me up at 4, but I’m bored and there’s nothing to do.”

LIGHT BULB.

“Oh, you’re Stretch! NOT the Grouch!”

I had just lectured my 13 yo, who was doing charity work for the day, on the value of responsibility and character.

Damn.

To make matters worse, two of my four were sitting next to me, laughing their fool heads off.

In my defense, I will assert that all four of my post-pubertal boys sound exactly alike on the phone. And I’ve never been good with names, anyway, frequently going through all four plus the dog when I’m really annoyed.

I will doubtless never live this down. I’m just hoping no one tells the Grouch.

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Tags: child, Children, college, humor, mother, Parenting, responsibility, telephone

17 Comments

Deanna

Monday, 22nd June 2009 at 8:41 am

rofl!
He can save this for future use – when he needs to hear this lecture for something he actually DID do, he can pull from his reserve, and save you the trouble.
(My dad never knows which one of us four girls are calling him, either.)

Deanna’s last blog post..See Bucky See Chicago

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