At night, we've started experimenting with keeping our youngest son in a crate. He's 13, and in the early stages of a rough pubescence _ is that redundant? Aren't all pubescences rough? Like hurricanes and root canals, aren't they all a little harrowing?
So we've turned to the puppy crate instead.
What you do is have teens crawl inside at the end of the day. It ensures they stay home in the evenings, and don't redecorate their bedrooms with slasher posters.
It also, according to some reports, keeps them from growing too big.
We decided to crate him after the anti-puberty paint failed to work as promised. Home Depot had developed the stuff _ a slight chemical alteration of their standard, mid-priced latex. I think all they really do is add acne cream and codeine.
As advertised, this new wall paint is supposed to blot out either smoke damage or puberty. At my wife's urging, we used two coats on his bedroom, then _ just to be safe _ painted the kid himself.
He proved remarkably cooperative, which led me to think the paint might actually be working.
Yet spiritually, nothing changed. He was still an impatient know-it-all who mocked our IT skills. His taste in music turned increasingly thumpy. When he ate, which was all the time, crumbs cascaded down his chest like boulders off a cliff. It seemed a form of erosion.
If that sounds familiar, you might try the puppy crate. Once teens get used to it, they respond very well.
Like many forms of incarceration, it's weird at first but quickly becomes the norm.
Speaking of being locked away, his mother signed him up for camp, the sleep-away kind where they plop watery scrambled eggs on your plate with an old ice cream scoop.
"Here kid, take that," the cook says with a gleeful vengeance. "Now move along before I give you more."
The little guy's too-big duffle bag is packed with new shirts and 100 pairs of socks. His mother pulled off all the Target tags. She knows he'd play tennis for a week, with tags and labels flapping about, then complain about the chafing.
So off to tennis camp he goes, armed with his big sister's old racket and his mother's smile. I'm not sure that's enough, but what else can you give a guy?
Firecrackers? Water balloons? A sword?
I'm sure he'll fit in. He's an odd kid _ so he's got that going for him. All kids are a little goofy. Like puppies. Like circus clowns. God isn't "in the details," as the saying goes. He's in our children.
When they gather like this _ for summer camp _ they form little conventions of idiocy and wonder. Given the circumstances, you'd think they'd be nicer to each other. Eventually, they are.
Yep, off to camp he goes, this magnificent beast, this experiment in enlightened American parenting _ an ornery, confused, funny, astute, whimsical puppy-man eventually headed for even greater things in life.
If only we can get him to comb his hair in the places he can't see.
Like many pubescents, the little guy has a hot spot on his head where the grass grows extra thick.
Once in awhile he can't get a curl not to curl across his forehead, no matter how much he damps it with warm water or spritzes it with glue.
In these cases, he asks me to clip it for him. We stand in the bathroom, me urging him to hold still, as he tells me where to cut.
He's reached the age where hair is more important than a face, or a brain, or whether you're a nice person or not.
At 13, hair is life.
When I'm done, I'm always tempted to keep the clipping, as his mother did with his first haircut ... a little souvenir. It's not so much the tiny ginger curl itself as it is a remnant of these fleeting personal moments where he still needs me.
In that sense, hair really is life.
What I've learned from life is that parenting is a little addictive. Sure, the kids really hold you back. But they do it in some winsome and endearing ways, no matter how insane they sometimes make you.
Another thing I've learned: Too soon this kid will be begging me for the car keys; after that, for every penny I've ever earned (for college).
Then, with a handshake and his mother's smile, he'll be off to camp for good.
