Not a Boy and Not a Man

Back in October I took a wonderful class at Gotham Writers’ Workshop called, somewhat uncreatively, How to Blog.  Among the many benefits of the class was the chance to “meet” a woman who has become an integral part of my new online community: Linda Pressman of Bar Mitzvahzilla.

At Bar Mitzvahzilla, Linda writes with great humor and even greater humanity about her son (the Bar Mitzvahzilla himself), her daughter, her husband, her indomitable mother, her six (!) sisters, life, and love.  I admire Linda’s ability to find the lesson in any anecdote – and to do so with unerring wit and intelligence.  I also look up to Linda as an experienced mom who reflects on her family and herself with tremendous perspective.

It is my pleasure to welcome Linda to Motherese for a neighborly chat today.  After you read her post here, please stop by her place for another helping of Linda’s writing at Bar Mitzvahzilla.

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Not a Boy and Not a Man

by Linda Pressman of Bar Mitzvahzilla

Once I had a tiny son who could be brought to any park in the world, unsnapped from his car seat and, like a revving engine, set on the ground and he was off. Rolling in the grass, playing in the sand, kicking balls, head first down the slide, chasing kids he didn’t know, an ape on the jungle gym, and swinging into the sky. He could go and go and go – all day and all night – his battery was always charged. His fun would only end when we hunted him down and lured him into our car, the seat belt click sounding the end to his freedom.

But things change when you have a son who’s fourteen.

I used to love sitting on a park bench reading or writing while the kids played safely nearby. Now I’m no longer alone. Next to me sits a silent, brooding teenaged lug, along with his man-sized body, his gigantic arms and legs, his big feet, and an alarming blonde moustache. He apparently is too old for the park. He’s too big or too old for every single thing at the park except for sitting there next to me on my bench.

How did this happen? I remember the years. Kind of. I certainly remember the phases – the Lion King phase; the Spiderman phase when he really wanted to climb walls; the Darth Vader phase, sneaking up on me with light sabers swishing in the air. And then I remember the day that his feet touched the ground when he was trying to swing on the jungle gym, like the ground had grown and not his legs. The next thing I knew he was sitting on the park bench next to me.

So there he sits. And there my book sits and my writer’s journal, face down on the bench in between us.

Since he can be a little conversationally challenged, and since I’ve found that it’s generally not a good thing to let teenagers brood too long or stare at electronics too much, I’ve thought of a series of questions that I can ask him to get him talking.  My questions are designed to set him off on a twisting, winding, conversational labyrinth that won’t stop until my eyes roll back in my head. What’s the coolest new video game on the market? The best video gaming system?  Which one was the best Terminator movie? What’s his dream car? That one really gets him going. He blossoms when talking about his future Lamborghini. Of course, he’s getting a Honda.

There are some things he will still do. He’ll play basketball anytime and anywhere, but he has to remember to bring a ball. He’ll surf like a beach bum in the ocean but first we have to get him out of land-locked Arizona and over to the ocean. He’ll swim in any pool but lately he wears a t-shirt, hiding something on his upper body. I figure it’s probably one valiant, newly sprouted chest hair, but won’t I be the fool if he has a Siamese twin growing under there?

He reads books obsessively, but only books with blood and gore and confusing Sci-Fi plot twists. And he plays video games with such intensity that if I didn’t tell him to stop he would actually never stop. He’d forget to go to college and forget to get married. He’d only stop decades later when, finally, his hands froze up with arthritis on the controls.

Stuck in the middle with Bar Mitzvahzilla. He’s not a boy and he’s not a man.

What phases have come and gone already with your kids, without you even noticing that they’re gone? Have you ever calculatedly used a conversation starter like me? Have you gone through different park phases?

Tagged as: Bar Mitzvahzilla, guest post, Linda Pressman, Motherese, mothereseblog