My oldest son, fondly referred to as The Writer, recently turned fourteen. A year into this "mom of a teenager" gig, I've got some new reflections or musings and wanted to share them with you, because some parts of teenager-hood just aren't talked about enough.
We hear plenty of how sullen and moody they are. How they push the boundaries and test the limits and talk back and suddenly develop Attitude. We hear all the horror stories and funny tales about surviving the teen years, and how teen boys have appetites big enough for whole countries. We hear about all of those things, often.
But we don't hear very much about the cool things, the good things, the bits and pieces of watching a teenager unfold, a boy merge into a man, before your very eyes. The mystery and joy of seeing a child grow into an adult, the personality traits that frustrated you in the toddler now making you proud in the teen. "Stubborn" at four really does look like "determined" at fourteen. The baby who thought line drawings of molecules seemed interesting now looks at those same drawings and begins to understand them. The child who recognized his letters, could name them on sight, before he was two is now reading Poe.
Yes, folks; Poe. He's reading Poe. For fun. And mostly understanding it.
In a moment of boredom yesterday he asked if he had anything available to read. I oh so kindly pointed out shelf after shelf of books that live in this house and then realized I had a golden opportunity here to suggest something he might enjoy. My suggestion surprised us both. Well, not really; he didn't know enough about Poe to be surprised. But it surprised me.
I glanced over the shelves, searching for something to capture my boy's interest, yet something that said "I know you aren't a kid anymore and don't like reading the same books as your younger brother these days...." That's when I saw it, the Complete Collection of Stories & Poems by Edgar Allen Poe. Picked up for a song at a library book fair several years ago. Tucked on the shelf for random reading. Moved to the back of a closet in recent times, and then to a bin of "to donate" books that were taking up room I didn't have to spare. The Poe, along with several other books, was rescued from the bin when we moved into the new house and suddenly did have room to spare. And so there it was. Sitting. Waiting. Ready for my boy to pick it up and begin reading.
Even if I wasn't quite. Ready, that is. I mean, sure, I suggested it. I offered it to him and found The Tell-Tale Heart in the contents and turned him to that page. I commented that The Raven was another famous poem if he finished the first one. And I left him to it, not really sure he'd like it, not really sure he'd keep reading past the first page.
But he did. He read The Tell-Tale Heart sitting on the couch while his brothers played. He flipped over to The Raven sitting at the patio table while his brothers debated a dip in the pool. He kept reading random selections while they (very briefly) swam. This morning he had it out again, reading another short story. He was intrigued, I was surprised & mystified. My little boy is reading Poe???
I'm not sure when it happened, but it did. Sure, he admits to not understanding all that he's read (heck, it's Poe. Of course he doesn't understand every single one he reads....), but he's reading grown-up stuff. No more Seuss over and over and over again. No more books chosen for size of text, number of pictures, number of pages between chapter breaks.
It's truly an amazing, wonderful, marvelous, crazy, strange, mystifying, glorious thing. A teenager in the house. Not a scary, frightening, doomed to be miserable thing at all. A chance to watch, to listen, to learn, to grow. To discuss literature. Or politics. Or philosophy.
We've lately included The Writer in our movie-watching, complete with the post-movie discussion period. A movie about lies leading up to the war in Iraq* becomes a chance to discuss how people bend the truth, distort the facts, and why that's a dangerous thing for leaders to do and something to be aware of in every news article you read.
A movie about a strange group of people whose job is to keep your life on track**, making sure you don't veer off The Plan, becomes a discussion of free will, choices, destiny, and if it's good or bad to have total freedom.
And handing a bored teenager a book of Poe's short stories leads to discussions about guilt, the conscience, death, and how to read & understand literature when at first it doesn't make sense.
But what's really going on is a parent, bonding with a child.
A discussion about these things teaches the boy that it's okay to ask questions, that his parents will answer as best they can and not judge him when he asks. A discussion about these things says to a boy "You are becoming our equal in some ways" and gives him the confidence to step tentatively forward into manhood, knowing his mom & dad respect him, value his opinions enough to ask about them, listen to them, hear him out as he speaks his mind. Even when the opinions are still being shaped, molded, tried on & tested --- these discussions let him test & try them on a safe audience.
And so a movie or two, a book of Poe, the discussions that follow....key ingredients in the transition from boy to man. Magic, happening right before my eyes. I say "what do you think about that?" and he hears "I value you, I respect you, what you say matters to me." Magic words. More powerful than any old please or thank-you ever was.
And this magic, this mystery.....this is the side of teenager that should be talked about. Not the grumpies, not the bottomless pit of a stomach, not the big bad attitude. The magic. The growing, not in stature but in maturity. The change, the shift, the subtle differences from one day to the next, the "blink and you'll miss it" growing up, from boy to man, before your very eyes.
Magic. Absolute magic. I would not trade this for anything else in the world.
for those who will ask, the movies were *Fair Game and **Adjustment Bureau. He understood, and intelligently discussed, both. Magic, I tell you. Absolute magic.
