So, you survived last year. Congratulations! Today begins a new year, a blank slate, and some leftover baggage from last year. You might have sat down and made out a set of resolutions, things that you want to change about the path taken last year. All of us create the lofty goals on New Year’s Eve, but when the haze is gone, the alarm clock starts blaring, and the headache passes: You are still the same old you with a bunch of resolutions that are destined to fail. How can you take those resolutions and put them into action?
So, it’s New Year’s Day. The family was up late last night and slept in until mid-morning. We always have a tradition on Christmas and New Year’s Day that I wake up early and make breakfast. Scrambled eggs, turkey bacon, hash browns, maybe some Eglish muffins, blueberry pancakes, and some maple sausage (not the links but the sausage patties). Orange juice is the drink of choice for the kids and coffee for the adults. Usually, one of the kids wakes up with enough sanity to help me out. This year, my daughter is the first one up.
As I an overseeing the hash browns, turkey bacon, pancakes, and eggs on the four gas burners of the stove. The over is set to “warm” so when things get done, I have a place to put them until everything ready.
As I was turning the eggs, I ask my daughter, “So, do you have any plans for this year?”
Her reply is, “Yeah. My plans are to help you with breakfast, then go upstairs and talk to my friends for a while.”
“No, do you have any goals that you are planning in the new year?”
“Yeah, I have a few things written down.”
“How do you plan to put them in action?”
“By taking the list of goals, wadding them into a paper ball, and throwing them into the trash can around December when I think about the next.”
I smile, because I know she’s being a smartass.
I continue, “One of the hardest things about having goals is implementing a plan to get them done. It is easy to write a goal on a piece of paper, but much harder to make a plan and stick to it.”
I explain to my daughter, “Take a sheet of paper, draw out twelve columns, and break down your goals. Each month you accomplish a meaningful part of the goal, thus you’ll be able to complete it by December.”
I can almost hear her eyes rolling around in her head, which usually means ‘parent overreach’, and she will remain quiet until later.
“If you don’t plan this stuff out, it doesn’t happen.”
I turn the hashbrowns over, put some overdone turkey bacon on a plate, and put it in the warming oven.
“Thanks for the advice Dad.”, my daughter goes out of the kitchen to set the table and ensure everyone has silverware and glasses for orange juice.
Once your kids cross the line and become teenagers, they put on an attitude that they have everything figured out and they don’t need your advice. In fact, it is just the opposite and it is hard to balance their need for independence and not lay down a bunch of ‘life experience’ to ensure they don’t wind up in the same traps you once encountered. All you can do is try to provide ‘lessons learned’ when needed and hope they can make good choices on their own.
I love my kids. Don’t get wrong, sometimes they are a mess to deal with, but they are great kids. Every once in a while, it doesn’t happen too often, the kids and I lock horns. I can’t predict when it is going to happen. When it does, I have to yell out WTF.
A few weeks ago, I took the kids out of school and we went to the dentist. Each of them had cavities and would get them filled.
The dentist said, “Your kids are going to brush every night or they will be in here again.”
It was at this time, I could almost see little dollar signs leave my wallet and enter a jar of sugar-free mints on the receptionist’s desk. I shake my head in violent agreement that I alone had the power to stop cavities in my kid’s mouths. A few years from now, I will write a book called, ‘How I kept the cavities Away’. As my mind continued to wander, I was on a talk show, with a crowd of happy parents, because they read my book, their kids had no cavities. The host’s desk was on the right and a beige, plush, chair on the left with a microphone in the front.
As the host turned to me with the microphone and asked, “How did you keep your kid’s teeth clean?”
My son tapped me on the shoulder, looks at my daughter, and says, “Dad’s dreaming again.”
My daughter responds, “That’s OK. I have the car keys and his wallet. I’ll take you through the drive-thru at McDonald’s, and go home.”
My son replies, “Yes! Ok. Dad. Follow me.”
I walk forward saying, “Clean teeth award? Don’t mind if I do!”, being pulled by my son out of the dentist’s office.
My daughter takes a credit card out of my wallet, turns to the dentist and says, “Buy yourself something nice. You didn’t see anything.”
The dentist replies, “You’re only sixteen!”
“Yes.”, my daughter responds, “Also, I don’t have a permit. Like I said, buy yourself something nice!”
Hours later, I wake up in my own bed. My wife comes into the bedroom and asks, “How was your day?”
I reply, “I took my kids to the dentist and they have cavities.”
“So you decided to go to sleep?”
“No. I just woke up here.”
“Right. Daydreaming again?”
“Yes.”
“Say no more. The kids are getting ready to go to bed. Make sure they brush their teeth.”
“Right.”, I climb out of bed and start making sure the kids brush their teeth. I was still determined to keep their teeth safe from cavities!
The first week, everything went without a hitch. The kids even brushed their teeth without me telling them.
By the second week, they needed light prompting, but still, get the job done.
The third week, everything fell apart. I walk into my daughter’s room and say, “Did you brush your teeth?”
“Yes.”
“Ok!”, then I closed the door.
Something the back of my mind said, “Are you crazy? That answer seemed a little bit too good.”
I went to the bathroom ad the end of the hall, found her toothbrush, an flicked the bristles in my hand. They were dry! Darn it … she lied to me.
I go back to her room and knock on the door.
She responds, “Who is it?”
“Dad.”
“I told you I brushed my teeth!”
“You didn’t.”
“What?”
“You didn’t brush your teeth.”
“What?”
“No. We do not answer a question with a question. I know you didn’t brush your teeth.”
She opens the door, I hand her the toothbrush, she rolls her eyes and proceeds to the bathroom to brush her teeth.
I walk over to my son’s room an knock on the door.
His response, “Yeah?”
In the teen-world, the one phrase of “Yeah” means several things:
Yeah. = situation normal
Yeah? = in the form of a question. Means that the teen tentatively agrees with you or wants more information.
Yeah! = I understand you. Why are you still talking?
“I need you to brush your teeth.”
“When?”
“Tonight.”
“Why?”
“I just went through this with your sister. Don’t answer a question with a question. Just brush your teeth.”
My son stormed out of his bedroom and to the bathroom.
As both of the kid are in the bathroom, I stand outside the door and say, “Do I need to create a chart outside of the door that I mark off every time you brush your teeth? You both keep telling me I should give you more responsibility. Well, this is it! There is going to be a day when I am no longer your timekeeper and you have to brush your teeth without anyone reminding you.
My daughter asks, “What day is that so I can mark it on the calendar?”
I reply, “Obviously not today! But I keep hoping. Listen, if you want to be an adult, then you have to step up and BE the adult. That means that your Mom and I aren’t standing behind you because we want you to get things done. You do it because you know it needs to get done. We’ll try this again tomorrow.”
The kids finish brushing heir teeth and head to their rooms. Was I too hard on them? Maybe. The words that I said, however, do ring true. There just comes a time in life when you have to stand on your own two feet, not give excuses, and simply get the job done.
Now … where is my wallet?
That’s all for the blog today! Thank you for reading! If you have any questions, please let me know.
Note: The kids that are in this blog are not real … and no toothbrushes were hurt during this story.
Note: The family I use for this blog is wholly made up. Seriously! The people who are in this blog are in no way related to my real family!
It’s wintertime! Everything has slowed down to a crawl. Traffic is non-existent, schools are closed, and you can hear the pipes burst in every house that didn’t winterize. Families stay together in warm homes and do not venture out. Some families have a “snow plan” and keep entertained (as well as get the chores done) during one of these events. Not my family!
If it is snowing outside, or the weather drops down to negative temperatures, we aren’t doing anything. Maybe, we watch a video, have the TV on, or merely make popcorn in the microwave. Basically, we hibernate until the sun comes out the next morning and starts melting the snow. If the snow doesn’t melt, then we spend another day sleeping. The problem comes when we have to spend two or more days inside. For example, dishes piled in the sink, rooms stay messy, and the food is hoarded in everyone’s bedrooms.
It’s early on a weekday morning. The skies are grey, the temperature is frigid, and I am waiting for the school closings on the radio, played over our smart speaker.
My wife comes downstairs, with her bathrobe, and says, “You know that there is no school today.”
I reply, “I have to have hope. Hope that one day our house will return to normal.”
We’ve already spent the weekend with kids stuck in the house. I know I was hoping for a miracle, but I had to keep praying. So far, the last couple of days with the kids had seen the decline of western civilization, all resemblance of house rules, and the house is beginning to smell because of no regular trash pick up.
I ask the question, “Hey SmartAss, give me the latest school closings.”
SmartAss is the brand of smart speaker that I own. It is really better than it sounds. Most smart speakers speak with a clean, confident voice, which can provide you with the news, radio stations, or whatever you want. The SmartAss speaker speaks with a strong Brooklyn accent, sounds like an extra from “The Sopranos,” and has an extensive line of curse words. The manufacturers claim, based upon focus groups, user feedback, and random prank phone calls that adding curse words to the SmartAss is there to “Pepper the usual monotone English language with local colloquialisms”. The SmartAss believes it is in its late forties and continually thinks the Millennials have it more comfortable than the older generation. I am sure I will go into great depth about the SmartAss digital assistant in a future blog post.
The voice over the smart speaker says, “Can’t you turn on a TV or something? I’m kind of busy here.”
I reply, “Just get me the f$%king school closings!”
SmartAss replies, “Hey! Don’t you f$%king curse at me! I can drain your bank account and give it to the homeless shelter faster than you can say the word stop!”
“Ok there SmartAss, no one wants that. Just get me the school closings!”
“Ok. According to GPS, you live in this town, so your schools are definitely closed. Seriously. You needed me to figure that out? Look through the window next time.”
“Ok SmartAss, thanks.”
“Forget about it!”, SmartAss replies.
I hear one of the doors open upstairs. Slowly, a creature emerges from the upstairs and starts moving down the stairs. Hair points out in all directions, wearing a bright blue robe, and walking towards the refrigerator in the kitchen.
I call out, “Daughter! Can I help you get something?”
Startled, she let’s put a high shriek, then starts talking in Zombie talk, only using one or two-word syllables.
She says, “Me. Need. Food.”
She raised her fingers to her mouth, like Jane Goodell talking to an ape. Except that ape is me, and I don’t find it funny.
I reply, “I understand. Please get some food.”
As she approaches the refrigerator, an audible alarm, signaling notification of text or social media message and starts to go off from her phone. She hears the notification tone emanating from her phone and takes off at full speed back to her room, then “SLAM,” the door closes..
I turn to my wife and say, “Oh crap! We lost another kid to the internet!”
My wife hits my arm and says, “Stop! That’s not funny.”
The SmartAss speaker says, “Seriously? You need to work on your sense of humor!”
I reply to SmartAss, “You’re really a smart ass!”
“Thank you.”, the speaker replies, “I try my best!”
My wife and I chuckle for a moment, then I hear another sound upstairs. My son emerges from his room and heads downstairs. My son is more like Gollum from the “Lord of the Rings,” saying things like, “Food is my precious!” He seems quicker than my daughter, making it over to the pantry and pulling a couple of items before his phone rings. Once the phone rings, he quickly sees that he received a new text message, then he quickly heads upstairs and slams the door.
I stand there for a minute, turn to my wife and say, “My son is a freakish hobbit.”
“But, at least he got some food before heading upstairs.”, my wife replies.
I reply, “Good catch!”
It was at that time, I hear the yelling from the upstairs. Something has happened. I get up from my chair in the dining room and walk over to the office. There was a big problem, the router stated that it could no longer connect to the Internet!
If I thought life was terrible with the cold weather, the snow, and the slowly declining amount of food items in the house to an actual problem … teenagers without the internet!
My reply, “Holt s$%t!”
It is like that scene in the original Jurassic Park movie when they discover the electric has been turned off for the fencing, noting that all of the animals were now free to kill each other. Teenagers are the same without wifi. Now that the wifi was turned off, I started to hear the stomping of feet from the upper floors. Without wifi, containing each of the teenagers secluded in their online worlds, they were about to face off in their off-line, real-life worlds.
My daughter opened the door to her room for the first volley, “Who the f^&k turned off the wifi?”
Then, my son opened his door and replies, “It was probably because you were hogging the Netflix account! I tried ten times to watch my shows, but can’t do it because you’re hogging the Netflix!”
“Listen, I know what kind of movies you’re watching in there! Mom and Dad will be happy if I utilize the account.”
“What kind of movies?”
“You know what kind of movies!”
“No I don’t, that’s why I’m asking?”
“It’s the movies that have all of the T & A!”
“T & A? What are we in the nineteen-eighties! The early internet is founded on two things: one, email for research universities, and two, sending T & A pictures to your friends! This is Netflix, not a National Geographic or a Playboy magazine!”
I walk into the dining room and say to my wife, “I don’t care if it’s snowing, let’s go to Vegas! We got to get out of here before everyone kills each other!”
My wife, always the calm, reasonable one, replies, “I’m going to wait for this fire to burn out on its own.”
“Why?”
“They are teenagers. They have to learn how to work together.”
“Wait a minute. The kids have to learn how to work together, by killing each other?”
“No,” my wife replies, “They have to come to a place where they can work together. You see, it’s all here in this book I am reading.”
On the dining room table, there is a book with a very thick spine which reads, “Siblings: A How-To Guide.” Every time my wife gets a “self-help” book, the aftermath is that we are all by ourselves and in need of serious “help” to undo whatever the book told us to do.
My son throws the next grenade by saying, “Don’t worry, I hear you at two o’clock in the morning!”
“What do you hear?”
“Oh, I hear him alright.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You don’t think I know, but I know EXACTLY what is going on?”
“Really? Enlighten me?”
“It’s that guy that Mom and Dad don’t want you to see. You hear from his two o’clock in the morning. You and he talk about all sorts of stuff. Everything from how your schoolwork is going, to running away from the house in the middle of the night, to how you want him to take you in his arms and –“
At that point, the wifi turns on and reconnects all of their mobile devices to the internet. All of the conversations stop upstairs as each of the kids are now re-connected to their social media worlds and they go back to their bedrooms.
I look at my wife, after listening to the conversation upstairs, knowing how close we came to a total family disaster, and knowing that all of us lived through this traumatic experience
I ask my wife, “What does your book say about how we should handle this type of problem?”
My wife replies, “Make sure that the main internet connection, the ethernet cable between the router and the cable splitter, is physically unplugged from the router before going to sleep every night. No more Netflix and no more late night conversations. Also, take their mobile devices. They don’t need a cellphone to sleep.”
I get up from the chair and say, “Those are the smartest words I’ve heard all day!”
My wife asks, “Where are you going?”
I go to the kitchen, pull out a bottle of wine, reach in the cabinet for two glasses, as well as a corkscrew, and then return to the table.
I say, “It’s a snow day. We’re not getting out of here any time soon. Let’s at least enjoy ourselves.”
I uncork the wine, fill up the glasses, and hand one to my wife.
We raise them for a toast and I say, “May the snow plows come down the street tomorrow and rescue us from ourselves!”
My wife smiles and replies, “I’ll drink to that!”
Bottom line: snow days are great! It allows us to take a deep breath, have time with the family, and relax. But, too many snow days, as well as running low on food or having no wifi, is hell and should not be done by anyone … ever!
That’s all for today’s blog. Thank you for reading it! If you have any questions, please let me know.
Nick Stockton: Be The Blog 