I No Longer Need

As my boys grow into young men, I revel in the fact that there are many things I no longer need to do for them. Since entering this adventure called parenting I’ve heard it proposed that the early years are physically exhausting, but the older years are more emotionally draining. I second that motion. But the irony is, there is an odd relationship between the things that wore me out back then and make me nuts today. For example…   

I no longer need to tie my boys’ shoes. Great, right? But apparently current style dictates that they don’t have to tie them anyway. There’s some secret magic skater way of lacing your shoes so they stay on – sort of. I know it’s ‘just a fad’ and I shouldn’t let it bother me, but I suspect that they still don’t really know how to tie their own shoes. They went straight from the world of toddler Velcro straps to teenage-magic-skater-lacing land without ever truly mastering that most basic of skills. And I just know that someday they’ll be in a therapy session blaming me for their shoe-tying inadequacies.

I no longer need to wash their faces after a meal…but after 3,117 family dinners I still have to tell them to put their napkins on their laps. And they’ve wasted more energy than Texas in the summertime trying to convince me of the logic of keeping the napkin on the table (next to their elbows, by the way, but that’s another subject) where it lies in much more convenient proximity to their hands and face. With love and calm clarity I explain that any potential future father-in-law will not agree, will refuse to offer his beautiful daughter’s hand in marriage, and they will forever be alone, childless and unhappy, and have nothing to show for their logic but a reputation for poor table manners and food stains on their pants.

I no longer need to help them get dressed and undressed like I did when they were two, three and four. They now get to choose their own clothes, locate them from off the floor or under the bed, and put them on all by themselves. Nowadays all I have to do is figure out some way to make them PULL UP THEIR PANTS! Yep, my boys have bought the idea that coolness is directly related to the sag of your jeans and the amount of boxer visible above your beltline. Do they think their boxers are cute enough…or clean enough…that they deserve to be the focal point of their ensemble? I guess I should just be thankful for baggy sweatshirts.