This is the kind of post where the title will make my husband nervous. “Oh no,” he’ll think, “I’m going to have to read about all her other men!”
Well, not all of them. But a few. And they are most threatening!
Now that I have two teenagers, there have been romances coming and going. Crushes and confusion and giggling and new relationships and ongoing relationships and boys that are absolute turds and other boys that are so stinkin’ cute and all that fun stuff. Suddenly I’m a fourteen year old girl again! I forget that it’s not me… it’s someone else’s turn while I have to be a sideline observer.
We are bound to get our hearts broken multiple times before we reach adulthood. Oops! Did I say we? I mean… they. The kids. My kids. Oh, but who am I kidding? I cried for two days when Nicky and his first girlfriend broke up. My heart is on the line, too!
Recent events have reminded me of a few of my early “relationships.”
When I was five, I was a flower girl in a wedding, and I fell in love with the ring bearer. We held hands for the whole wedding, and he showed his affection for me by stealing a handful of tiny toothpicks out of the sandwiches at the reception and presenting them to me. A while later, my parents took me to his house to see him (I was going to give him a pair of spurs because he was a little cowboy, and for some reason, I had some spare spurs). I was too shy to talk to him, and I hid behind my mom’s legs the whole visit.
When I was ten, I went through an entire relationship without ever speaking to the boy. His name was Ernie (just had to throw that out there because… well… his name was Ernie). Think what you will, but all the girls had a thing for Ernie. The kid never gave me the time of day, but out of the blue, the girl who sat in between us in class said, “Ernie wants to know if you’ll go out with him.” Back then, of course, that meant being boyfriend and girlfriend without actually going anywhere. So I said yea, and we “went out” for a while. The only thing that ever happened between us was he picked me for heads up seven up. Then one day, the girl who sat between us turned to me and said, “Ernie is breaking up with you now.” Of course, I was devastated and had to hold my head high the rest of the school day and act like nothing was wrong. My boyfriend, who never said a single word to me, didn’t want to be my boyfriend anymore.
I tell these two stories specifically because one of my children is in a texting “thing” with someone, but they will not talk to each other face to face. They completely ignore each other in person, but the second they part ways, they are on their phones. This is something I always worry about in our modern society. I love texting - it’s so convenient, and I love the ability to quickly check in with my people without causing a big interference in their time - but I am so glad I didn’t grow up with it.
I’ve been trying to help my kids develop healthy and effective social skills, but gosh, it’s hard, especially when I don’t feel like I have good social skills, myself. Deep down, I’m still the girl who wants to hide behind my mom’s legs.
So I tease my kid a bit about this silent relationship, but at the same time, I remember not knowing how to talk to someone that I like in person. Whether you’re five, fourteen, or forty it can still be a challenge. I just hope that somehow my kids learn and grow from these experiences and come out of it all with reparable hearts.
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