Hail to the new chief
For months there have been signs of change with the understanding that change is inevitable, unstoppable and immutable. Now, that change has come. The result will mean radical shifts in attitude and touch off epic struggles, the ripples of which will be felt for more than a decade.
No, this isn't about the inauguration next week. It's that adolescence has stormed into my household.
My oldest son is now subject to the volcanism churning within, and my wife and I are like the USGS, searching for indicators of when the next eruption will blast the side off the house, laying waste to all who dare enter the dead zone.
Okay, it's not really that bad. But mood swings and resistance to hearing any parental directive -- translation: annoyed at anything Mom or Dad says -- are very apparent.
Fortunately the boy has some reasoning skills and he can be brought back from the edg, with either saintly patience or the occasional sternness of a drill sergeant. Both work, depending on the situation. Most situations tend to involve younger brothers, consequently shortening the fuse due to mockery or shoring up the ego due to their sense of esprit de corpse -- meaning them destroying Mom and Dad.
Somewhere in here I am should probably give equal time to preteen/tween/teen girls. However I can't even claim to understand adult women -- often including my bride. Nor do I want to.
After watching my sister -- in -- law go through this, I learned that just speaking to a tween girl is like checking your gas tank with a match. At best it's comparable to playing chess against a mainframe computer Ñ you lose, no matter what.
Even the guys I know with sisters usually just shrug their shoulders. So I've resigned myself to the fact that a little mystery in life is a good thing.
Growing up, mine was a family of all boys. Simply put, Dad was the Alpha male and we knew it. Period. Oh, my brothers were dumb enough to put up a challenge or two, but Dad always prevailed. Notice I said them, not me. I was the good son -- the smart one.
Mom, God bless her, had only sisters and was pretty much raised by nuns. Therefore she had little clue about or understanding of the testosterone overdose that impacts the decision processes and resulting actions of every teen boy.
Fortunately for my sons, their mom had two brothers and, in her own right, is a very sharp cookie. Once our oldest son asked us a provocative question. As always, the answer and explanation were direct and succinct. For my wife's part of the exchange, I remain impressed with her poker -- faced composure and her confident delivery of that part of the discussion.
So change is here, and resistance is futile, because right behind our oldest is the middle, followed by the youngest. Adding to the chemistry is the Sicilian flare for the melodramatic, making one understand why certain species eat their young.
Copyright 2009 by David Falloure
