Mother of a Man-Child

My life with teenage boys

Surviving New Years Eve January 18, 2013

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Happy New Year to all!  Back after a three week break feeling very refreshed, although no doubt a week back at work will undo all the relaxation. Nevertheless, it was a very successful holiday with the kids, especially the men-children.  Testimony to this was the last night of our holiday away, when we asked if they would like to return to the same destination, and the same house next year, and the response was a resounding yes.

Initially we were somewhat concerned at the absence of the boys every day and night during our holiday– they were so quick to find their mates and things to do, father of a man-child felt we had wasted our money hiring a house that catered to the boys with their own sleeping and living area.  However we then reconsidered our position and agreed that a holiday where they were out having a good time, and we were having a good time with our daughter and friends and family was great for all.  A win-win so to speak.

Sister of a Man-Child wasn’t quite so enamoured with her holiday.  I suspect two things were a factor – one she loves having playmates, especially at the beach, so we need to ensure we catch up with friends and other kids (in the absence of her brothers).  And two, she did have a small accident that probably marred her holiday a bit.  Walking into the path of a cyclist doing almost 30kmh and being knocked violently to the road is bound to hurt.  So much so that we needed an ambulance to attend and a trip to the local hospital for some stiches and patching up of various grazes from top to toe.  Thankfully no broken bones so it didn’t completely ruin the second half of her holiday.

beer bottlesThe run up to NYE was interesting in itself.  We had kindly agreed that one of our men-children could have some friends to stay for the night, as most of his friends weren’t “local” to our holiday destination.  Of course, the pressure continued from him (or really his friends) to have more and more to stay.  I stood my ground to ensure we weren’t completely overrun with teenagers and successfully capped the number of bodies on spare mattresses on the actual night.  I also insisted that the girls that were attending (and not well known to me) either have their mothers call me or I would call them.  I wanted to be sure that firstly they had actually told their parents exactly what they were doing on the night, (yes, I have been a teenage girl before), ie. drinking alcohol, partying at the beach, then walking back to our home, and that also their parents understood that with our own friends to entertain, we weren’t going to be available to chase teenagers all over the place at midnight.

Controlling the sleep over was one thing, controlling “pre’s” (that’s short for pre-party drinks) quite another.  Naturally once the address was known, it seemed there were a few extras who decided they could come to our place early on New Years Eve (a bit stressful initially).  It gave me some insight into how quickly a party could get out of control and how strict you need to be with “invitations”.   So we had about 10 friends of one man-child, and suddenly the other man-child decided he too wanted to get into the act, so next thing he’s invited “the bois” (sic) and we have another half dozen teenagers.  To be fair he did ask permission first, and we did request names so we knew exactly who was attending (and all of them were known to us).

So what did we learn hosting a small gathering of teenagers for approx. four hours of “pre’s”:

  1. Make sure you feed them (helps line their stomachs and soak up the alcohol).  Keep it simple – snags, chicken wings and potato gems (I kid you not) proved very popular.
  2. Find countless excuses to “mingle” regularly.  Between several adults we did this, whilst also watching them from a balcony above at any rate.
  3. Don’t be afraid to interfere or take control, especially since it’s your house.  When we saw the shot glasses come out, they were quickly confiscated and the kids told “no shots on my watch thanks”.
  4. Expect the unexpected.  Like the girl whose mother dropped her off with a “thanks for having her to stay” and left me standing their gob-smacked thinking hang on a sec, that name wasn’t on the list.  I told the daughter I didn’t know where she planned to stay, but it wasn’t at our house and she knew that, and so did my son.
  5. Don’t be surprised to see just about every teenager smoking as well as drinking.  I really couldn’t believe they all smoked cigarettes – I thought in the last 30 years maybe things had changed in terms of attitudes to smoking.  Sadly, it seems it has not.
  6. Be thankful you are having “pre’s”.  It’s way less messy than what follows.

And what did my boys learn from the night:

  1. As parents we are “okay” sometimes, since we actually let them have “pre’s” and friends to stay.
  2. However, as parents we also call the shots and stick to our guns.
  3. We do like their friends, except the ones who lie to our faces.
  4. And lastly, that NYE is highly over-rated.  Naturally, once they hit the beach, where alcohol was prohibited (good), the party atmosphere died off pretty quickly and they were all home by about 12.30pm.  Even better.

There was a minor fuss the following day, when I learned that a few of them had been “rescued” from the beach late at night, having told another parent that we wouldn’t allow them to stay, and offered a bed at their house.  Instead of the REAL truth which was they were never INVITED to stay at our place in the first place.  And then they had the gall to turn up to our house the following morning to be collected by Mum.  You can imagine my views of the offending girls and how welcome they will be at my place in future can’t you?

So that was New Years for 2012/13.   We all survived it, and we all enjoyed it.  Will we do it again in 12 months time?  We shall see. 🙂

 

Season’s Greetings December 27, 2012

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christmas tree
Season’s Greetings to all. Christmas has come and gone, and so too has Santa for another year. The presents have been opened, the lashings of food devoured, the wine savoured, all shared joyously with family and friends.

Now the real wind down begins, in the great Australian tradition, with a beach-side holiday. No doubt there will be a few stories to tell of the boys New Year’s Eve adventures, but for now dear readers I am taking a short break, as I hope you are, and recharging the batteries. That means time away from the laptop (and other devices), and therefore my blog.

Thank you for your continued readership of my blog during 2012, and I look forward to entertaining you with more man-child tales in 2013.

 

School holiday madness December 14, 2012

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HolidaysThe men-children are now on school holidays for at least 8 weeks.  In the case of one, he won’t be returning to “school” officially (TAFE instead as you recall next year) so he probably feels like someone who just got released from gaol.  And with the freedom from their normal schedules, they seem to believe they are also released from all other responsibilities.

I am not sure whether it’s a boy thing, or just a man-child thing (meaning my own sons), but all common courtesy, common sense, and common helpfulness has evaporated completely from the boys since holidays began.  They seem to believe that a carefree existence is normal for them and therefore for everyone around them.  We don’t know where they are, where they are going, when they’ll be home for dinner, if they’ll be home at all, and if they are they may have a few mates along with them.

Now I don’t know about everyone else, but I do believe it is common courtesy and respect for one’s parents that you at least keep them in the loop.  But no, our men-children seem to have their own ideas.  I do see it as a major failing on my part as a parent that my sons have not learnt such basic skills, so I can only hope that it’s an adolescent, carefree (and careless) attitude that will slowly fade as they morph into adults, with increased responsibilities.

Since they are so rarely here for dinner, our rule from a while back is we don’t even cook for them on school holidays, such is their unreliability.  If they expect dinner, then they need to let us know they will be here.  The reality is our habit is to cook for five people, so there’s generally enough if they “drop in” to join us.  However the other night, one of the men-children strolled into the kitchen and asked “what’s for dinner?”  As it was a Friday night, and I had of course worked all week, I simply explained (without an ounce of guilt):  “It’s Friday night, I don’t cook on Friday night.  Get your own.“  It works both ways!

Such is the extent of their rudeness, and seemingly lack of ability to even grasp the most basic of skills, the other day, one of the men-children was asking for the address of the holiday house we will stay at over summer.  When I enquired for whom, I was advised it was for all the people who were going to stay at our house on New Years Eve.  Well, you can imagine how quickly I hit the brakes on that conversation, doing a little more fact-finding very quickly.  Small details like how many are you inviting, and whom exactly?  And do their parents know that a bed (mattress on the floor) does not constitute me accepting responsibility for their under age daughters at Portsea for new years?   He was aghast that I not only expected the parents to phone me to make sure it was kosher, but if they didn’t then I would ring them all to ensure the ground rules were clear.  You see, I have been a 16-year-old girl before, so I know how it works (and how the truth can be very distorted depending on what you actually SAY).

After a lecture about the courtesy of actually asking before you invite five friends to stay, the same man-child went out that night to a gathering.  He had a few mates here before hand (of course he didn’t ask), went off to the party, and told me he didn’t know if he was staying at home or at his girlfriends for the night. I was pretty surprised to hear him and three mates arrive home at 3.30am at our house, (yep, thanks again for the heads up – they don’t listen or learn clearly), and then proceed to start-up the play-station for a few games.  No they don’t care if someone else (twin brother) is trying to sleep upstairs too.  So I yelled up the stairs to shut it down and get to bed – there was no argument – a grumpy mother always wins at that hour.  But I was left lamenting again why he just didn’t get my point of earlier in the day, and have ANY consideration for anyone else.

When the same child mentioned that he was planning to have some mates over to christen the new “party” deck we have just built, we casually asked how many that might be.  “Oh 15, maybe 30 people”!  WTF.  He has no idea…..really.

It is times like these that Father of a Man-Child and I tend to shut down their social lives, rein them in, ensure they’re at home for dinner, and use the chance to get some normalcy back in their lives and ours.  Sometimes the routine of being at school can actually be good for everyone.

So am I being unreasonable?  Or am I a stressed out parent who should just RELAX a bit more about her teenage boys?  Does a few weeks/months of being carefree matter at the end of the day, for them or us?  Or should I just accept that I am losing control of them, they are 16, and it ain’t going to get any easier to tell them what to do, as one reminded me the other day, when he casually mentioned that the piercing he has been so in favour of for a few years is now likely to become a reality very soon now that he has left school – great!

The last time he mentioned getting a piercing, we had to argue very strongly with him to avoid it.  Read more here.

 

 

Men-Children alone in the house for a weekend? January 6, 2012

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Happy New Year to all my readers.  I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas.  Well the Griswold Family have just returned from a great short holiday in Sydney.  We did all the tourist icons with the kids – Harbour Bridge, Opera House, The Rocks, Darling Harbour, Westfield Eye Tower, Bondi Beach, Manly Beach and Luna Park amongst others.  There’s no doubt being a tourist is hard work – it’s quite an exhausting holiday, but satisfying nevertheless.

Highlights for the Men-Children included doing the bridge climb (highly recommended) and jet-boating on the harbour, and for Sister of a Man-Child it was a photo with Maxy, one of the famous Bondi Rescue surf life savers, Luna Park, and seeing the NYE fireworks over the Harbour Bridge.  Much to the boys’ disappointment their plans for NYE didn’t quite work out as they hoped (they tried trust me), so they spent the night with us and our friends.  It wasn’t all bad as we were harbour-side to watch the Sydney fireworks and it’s not every year you get the chance to do that.  And we did buy them some alcohol so they could share in the festivities (Jim Beam & Cola being their drink of choice – Yuk!).  I have no doubt that will be the last NYE they will ever spend with us – and eventually just like us they will realise it’s a highly over rated night.

Having returned home, we’re all still in holiday mode and planning further escapes during January.  They boys have invitations to go beach-side with friends, and more sport camps so that should keep them occupied until school returns.  When an opportunity came up for a couple of weekends away with Sister of a Man-Child we both jumped at it.  One of the weekends was cleverly co-ordinated to coincide with the boys’ absence.  However, only at the last minute did we realise that heading away this weekend meant leaving the boys home alone.  And we hadn’t really thought about organising an alternative.

A couple of thoughts sprang to mind about how we might approach our absence:

  • Don’t tell them until the last minute, so they can’t plan anything.  (Or maybe don’t mention it at all and see if they call us to find out where we are – a bit of role reversal?)
  • Tell the neighbours to keep an eye on them and let us know if an impromptu party of 200 teenagers eventuates.
  • Threaten death if anything happens to the house.
  • Tell them we’ll be home on Saturday night (when it’s really Sunday night).
  • Ask the aunties to do drive-bys (do you think every hour is overkill?)
  • Panic!

The latter happened when I chatted to my twin sister and we both recalled the first time our parents left us at home for a weekend and “trusted us to do the right thing”.  Well, you can guess what happened can’t you?  Within 2 minutes of them leaving the house, we were on the phone to our mates organising a party.  And a great party it was, followed naturally by us cleaning the house to within an inch of its life.  A sure giveaway don’t you think?

Of course we got sprung – nothing to do with the stench of smoke and alcohol that I am sure permeated the entire house, or the motorbike divets left on the front lawn by someone’s boyfriend (I seem to recall his name was “Moose”).  My father (“hawk-eye”) wondered who had moved the fridge?  For God’s sake, who would have thought?  Naturally it wasn’t something we noticed was it? We blamed Moose – a mammoth of a man, and the only one big enough to do it!   I can’t recall the exact punishment metered out for this particular crime; there were quite a few over our teenage years.  We were probably grounded for a year or two, or perhaps it was the time when our invitation to go skiing with the neighbours to babysit their daughter was declined, much to our immense disappointment (and just quietly to our parents relief I suspect).

So as I post this, we will be on the road to our weekend away, and the boys will be “free” for the weekend.   If you should happen to see anything on Facebook about a party at our place, please let me know urgently (they’re not my friends on FB remember). 🙂

 

“Best Holiday Ever” Declares Man-Child October 7, 2011

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hamilton island viewAs any parent of a teenager knows, there are challenges taking your offspring on holidays, especially if it’s just a family holiday.  So I was delighted to hear that our recent trip was the “best holiday ever” from one of the men-children as we returned from the airport yesterday.   Add to that myself, Father of a Man-Child and Sister of a Man-Child all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and we’re on a winner.

So what’s the secret to success?  Well we didn’t leave Australia for some exotic destination like Bali or Fiji or Thailand.  We went to Hamilton Island – sun, sand and a flight all adding to the appeal of the trip.  We didn’t holiday with friends, but rather the father-in-law (potential recipe for disaster but actually pretty smooth sailing thankfully).   We didn’t have surf (which the boys love) but the plethora of water sports meant that there was plenty of options at the beach.  In short, they had so much to do they had no time to be bored.

What teenager wouldn’t enjoy the following:

  • Driving the golf carts every day on the island since that’s the only form of transport (okay, yes, they don’t have their licence yet, but how much trouble can an almost 16-year-old cause in a vehicle that doesn’t do over 20kmh?  We could get used to being chauffeured everywhere actually.)
  • More water sports than you can poke a stick at, including paddle boards, kayaking, catamarans, snorkelling on offer every day.  They just about had a go at everything.
  • Donut rides – you can imagine how fast the boat driver went because he was determined to fling the two men-children off the donut as often as possible – they LOVED it.
  • A trip to Whitehaven Beach to see one of the most stunning beaches in the world and to Dent Island to play golf on a spectacularly scenic (but difficult) course.
  • Go-Karting – just a bit faster than the golf buggies!
  • Fishing on a nice big cruiser (sadly it was a bit rough so one of the men-children spent the entire four hours sea sick and heaving his guts up over the side, along with two other adults and a poor 6-year-old boy).
  • Early morning runs with the sports club (they’re in pre-season for rowing so are quite serious about doing sport at the moment). 🙂

swimming poolAdd to the above a brilliant house with a pool and view to die for and plenty of room for everyone, and you’ve got a recipe for success.  Sister of a Man-Child also had plenty to do activity wise, and Father of a Man-Child and Mother of a Man-Child were able to relax and read countless books and dawdle over morning papers.  The holiday was even more relaxing because no laptops or PS3’s accompanied us, so the boys were pretty limited to Facebook updates and texting their friends back home.  I especially relished the break from all the technology that drives our lives on a daily basis.

You know the holiday has been long enough when they start fighting again just like at home – the last 24 hours of our 9 day trip showed that about a week on the island was right.

The only issue we faced was the discussion about our next holiday – hopefully to Sydney over the Christmas/New Year break.   When the men-children learned we plan to be away for New Years Eve they were aghast.  “But we HAVE to be in Melbourne for NYE, we already have plans (to get drunk somewhere)……well not Melbourne actually, we’ll be away with friends (away from our parents who control our lives)……”

We decided to drop the discussion until we got home – it was set to ruin our happy holiday.  Now we face the decision – do we force them on the family holiday, or adapt our plans to suit them?  There’s a number of reasons supporting both points of view and options that could fill a whole blog post that I won’t bore you with now – but suffice to say it’s going to be an interesting decision.  The men-children are all for a trip to Sydney – just not for NYE.  We shall see.

 

Mother of a Man-Child: New Years at Portsea – 30 years on… January 14, 2011

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When I was 14 years old, and again at 15 years old, I begged my parents to be allowed to go to Portsea for New Years Eve. Naturally they said “NO” – not a surprise.  By the time I was finally permitted to go years later, I actually no longer wanted to go, because my peer group had moved on.  Clearly that was the intention of my parents. 🙂

As readers of my blog know, I am now experiencing first hand with my Men-Children what my parents experienced with my twin and me as their teenage daughters.  My Men-Children seem to be exhibiting extremely similar (scarily so) behaviour at exactly the same age.  Of course my father is thoroughly amused by all this – call it Karma.  Since I turned out all right, we can also assume that my Men-Children also stand a reasonable chance, so he doesn’t seem at all worried.  He’s more interested to see how I respond to the challenges of parenting a mini-me of myself.

So it should come as no surprise that Man-Child I wanted to go to Portsea for New Years Eve this year.  I am sure he planted the seed months ago with a mate, to secure a berth at someone’s house.  Which of course made it much easier for me to say I would think about it and eventually to agree.  Apparently they were off to a party at a friend’s house, which they would walk to (much better that no cars are allowed on the roads in my view).

The day before New Years, having asked the boys to tidy their room ahead of guests visiting the beach house, naturally it was me who ended up picking up wet towels off the floor and dragging doonas onto beds.  Whilst doing so I came across a bag under the bunk beds and when I pulled it out, discovered a number of grey school socks covering something cylindrical.  My first thought was large firecrackers, but alas what I found were individually wrapped stubbies of beer.  Yes that’s right, 24 bottles of warm beer.  It took me less than 0.5 seconds to work out who they belonged to and for what reason, so I picked them up and took them with me to find Man-Child I.  You can imagine his face…priceless!

The funniest thing for me was that I had asked before we left Melbourne where all the school socks were as they had strangely disappeared from the laundry.  The boys nervously responded that Man-Child I now wore his school socks with casual clothes, which I commented was very “gay” quite frankly.  Little did I know!

For once (and yes this may come as a surprise) I actually didn’t determine the resulting punishment on the spot.  I calmly advised Man-Child I there were a number of possible outcomes, namely:

  • Option 1:  Confiscate the alcohol but still allow him to go (fair)
  • Option 2:  Not allow him to go at all (very mean)
  • Option 3:  Allow him to go with the alcohol (I didn’t mention this option, but I had it up my sleeve just in case)

I then drilled him to understand how he had actually managed to acquire the beer?  We went from an un-named bottle shop in Glenferrie Road with him purchasing them initially, to the eventual truth – namely paying a “random” to buy them for him.  That was after I threatened to visit the said bottle shop and have them shut down for selling alcohol to minors.  Trust me, I so would do it!

When I told my husband about my discovery, he admitted that he actually knew about the beer!  I was not amused.  He had apparently caught our men-children passing the beer over the back fence to hide in the garden – strangely on the weekend when he was gardening.  Considering they’d been on school holidays for weeks and we’d both been working full-time I was a little surprised they were that stupid.

I was also furious to learn that Father of a Man-Child’s response had been “I don’t want to know about it”, so they had considered that tacit approval (yet again).  I mentioned that I considered that to be a clear failure of Parenting 101 and dodging responsibility.  Grrr…

As we were entertaining friends, it was several hours later before we got around to discussing what should happen with the beer.  By this stage, my friends knew about the find (it made a good story over drinks), and I had also sought the advice of my sisters and discussed/argued about it with my husband and father-in-law.

Actually it was the latter (wise older man) who had the best suggestion.  As he was kindly and conveniently taking Man-Child I to Portsea himself, he said he would take the beer as long as the parents of Man-Child’s friend knew he was bringing it.  I reasoned that this was a good approach – we were being very transparent (no more sneakiness), and the parents accepted some responsibility also.

So the result?  Countless texts and phone calls later it was all sorted.  Option 3 came to fruition – he got to go AND take the beer.  OMG, yes Mother of a Man-Child actually gave in, much to the chagrin of Man-Child II.  This is history in the making you realize?  This also meant Man-Child I was allowed to get the beers in the fridge before hand, guaranteeing an icy cold beverage.  You wouldn’t believe what they were proposing to ensure they had cold beers otherwise.

And the night?  They went to a mate’s (with beers in the back packs) then onto Shelley Beach.  The perfect hot and windy 40-degree day and night to end the year and mark the beginning of 2011.   Man-Child I survived it, no doubt sobered up by having to walk miles from his friend’s house and home again.   The only incident I learned about was a friend who had his front teeth knocked out by a charming bogan on the beach – although I understand he asked for it!

So I find myself on the cusp of another stage in adolescence.   One where I actually accept that they might just be old enough to partake selectively in alcohol…although I know it’s really not good for them at all.

And if you’re wondering what Man-Child II got up to, he didn’t manage to get to Portsea or Sorrento, or have a friend down (some things just don’t work out).  So he spent the night with some of our friends and us and we really enjoyed his company.  We even let him have a beer with us.  Cheers!