48 hours after I post my piece on Sex and the family, my son comes home from a friend’s house to say,
“Mom are you blogging about sex and me?”
I gulp and buy myself some time with a counter accusation, “Are you reading my blogs?”
He wasn’t, but he was sleeping over his friend’s house, and his friend’s mother was reading my blog, and she asked, “How do you feel about your mom writing about you and sex?”
Geez! Is it me or did this mom cross the line? 🙂 I know my blog is public, and it’s only a matter of time before everything I write gets around town, but I thought a fellow mom would have my back.
Maybe it was his back she had.
“What did you say?” I ask.
“I told her that I don’t read what you write. I get less upset that way.,” he says.
“The post got a lot of hits,” I tell him, hoping to soften the blow. (He loves anything to do with numbers.) “I could change your name,” I add, but he just shakes his head and heads up to his room.
Later that day, we enforce a family walk along the Connecticut. It’s an exquisite fall afternoon, with a bright sun and sweatshirt-friendly air. Within moments of crunching down the river path, my teen starts to ask how far we plan to walk.
“Look at the leaves,” I suggest. “There are so many shapes and colors. Smell them!” He’s not interested– until I suggest a competition. I give everyone three minutes and a square foot of earth.
There’s controversy over who wins because of different varieties of the same species, but in the end he skillfully identifies: beech, ash, three different maples and four different oaks.
I smile without letting him see, realizing that he still has his deep connection to the woods, even if he prefers his I Pod and X Box at this stage of the game.
After this magical moment, the walk degenerates into an acorn chucking fight between the boys. Within moments, my nine-year old is whining and my husband and I are yelling. I bring up the Sex post again just to shift the dynamic.
“Mom, just stop telling people that I can’t date until I’m 18. It’s embarrassing,”he says.
“Okay,” I say. “I’ll tell them that you’ve been able to date since you were six– that you’re even allowed to get married right now if you want.”
“Just don’t say anything, Mom,” he says, without cracking a smile at my great sense of humor.
“What about porn? Can I still talk about that?”
Surprisingly, he gives me his approval, as he chucks another acorn at his little brother.
“It was just a little egg-corn,” he says, still mispronouncing it the way he did as a little boy.
Families with kids in strollers go by. Almost everybody on the path has a dog. “Are we weird because we don’t have a dog?” I ask.
“No, we’re just weird period,” my teen says.
“You’re supposed to think we’re weird,” I say in defense. “How else will you leave us?”
By the time we get back into our car to cross the river, we’re rosy cheeked and smiling– until we smell something…
My youngest has stepped in dog poop.
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The Empty Nest Diary 