The other night I ran into an old friend at the bar, and as we got to talking I realized how odd it was that our children, who are practically the same age, have never really hung out.
“We should totally get them together!” I enthused. “It would be great!”
And just like that I was planning outings in my head—maybe the movies, maybe a hike, maybe a backyard BBQ. And then I remembered that the children in question were actually both seventeen years old, and that you can’t plan play dates for seventeen year olds. Well, you can, but I think you have to call it a blind date.
It was enough to make me almost miss the days when I could simply plan a play date, the days when I wasn’t just their social secretary, I was their social director. The days when I got to be the one who decided when the party started, when it ended, and who was invited, and there was no discussion about it because I could win any argument simply by picking up the disagreeing party and walking out of the room.
Of course those days also meant that they could win any argument (or at least prolong it) by throwing themselves on the ground and refusing to move.
I suppose we could both still behave that way (although my back cringes at the thought of picking my son up in anything but a fireman’s carry, and cooperation is always best for that particular lift), but I think that it’s better that we have moved our disagreements from the physical to the verbal plane. Or at least that’s how I feel until the moment comes when I’m actually involved in the argument. Then the fireman’s carry starts to look pretty good.
Part of the problem is that my kids—and my daughter, especially—can turn any argument into a debate. What’s the difference, you ask? An argument is when I say it’s time to clean your room and you say, “I’ll do it later.” A debate is when I say it’s time to clean your room and you say, “How long have you been participating in Western bourgeois notions of cleanliness? Does it satisfy your sense of place in a gender normative society?” Yeah, it’s pretty hard to fireman’s carry your way out of that one.
The truth is, however, I only have myself to blame: I’ve always loved a good argument, and have always been willing to debate any topic with my children, certain in the knowledge that since I am right, I will win. “Why can’t I jump on the bed?” “Because the bed is old, the floor is old, and if you fall off and break your arm I refuse to pay the five-hundred dollar deductible in November, so by the time we get to the doctor’s in January they’ll probably have to amputate and there is no way I’m going to follow you around for the rest of your life making sure you are able to properly wipe your butt with only one arm.”
Used to be by the time I got to the end of an explanation like that they’d forgotten there ever was anything called a “bed” in the first place, let alone a desire to jump on it. But now they beat me at my own game.
“It always comes down to money with you, doesn’t it?” they say in their best fake sad voice.
“Says the person who has none,” I reply. But the damage has been done, and it’s obvious that they will soon be able to out-debate me. Next thing I know they’ll be able to pick me up and carry me out of any party.
Which, come to think about it, actually might not be a bad thing.