Hoochiemumma

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Tag: tweens

Mrs Weird of Weirdsville

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I was stuck in a room with my 15 year old son for 4 days. He was beyond thrilled to say the least.

CF has landed him back in hospital for a bit. Topped off nicely, was the fact he developed a cold so a Covid test was needed….Then lockdown hit so we weren’t going anywhere. Mr Lucky had me within arms reach for a longer stint than we planned.

During our iso situation, he made a comment after I hung the phone up from speaking with the ward clerk.

“You’re weird” he said.

After he got told to get stuffed, I dug a bit deeper…

“Weird how?… like scary weird or quirky weird or what?” I asked.

“Or is it just because I’m your mum and every kid thinks their parents are weird.” I added.

“Na… you ask any of my friends and they all rekon you’re a bit weird”.

This was also confirmed by my almost teen daughter when she looked at me, screwed her nose up a little and sympathetically replied to my inquisition with “well… yeah, you kinda are”.

Excellent. That’s what everyone wants to hear.

I would have happily settled for any other description than weird.

Clearly I’m not the cool mum, the laid back mum, the strict mum, the mum with the best pantry snacks mum, the handy mum, the smart mum, the chatty mum, the quiet mum, the funny mum, the friendly mum, the kind mum, the cranky mum, the “insert any other adjective you can think of” mum. Nope….I’m the WEIRD mum.

But look, if teenagers think I’m weird then I’m pretty ok with that because there’s some seriously weird shit going on in the land of the teen.

Weird is taking photos of a quarter of your head, writing “streaks” across it then sending it to all of your friends on Snapchat as a form of entertainment and connection.

Weird is not using a phone to TALK. Alexander Graham Bell would be quite miffed.

Weird is wearing socks and slides.

Weird is the ability to text at 300 wpm but the inability to get clothes INTO the laundry basket.

Weird is the resurgence of the 80’s mullet and somehow making it even uglier. Just stop it.

Weird is knowing every AFL player trade but not knowing how long to heat something up in the microwave. Like ever.

Weird is doing the SAME ANNOYING CRAP EVERY SINGLE DAY and then acting completely shocked when I lose my ever loving mind.

Weird is having a tanty after being asked to empty the dishwasher after a hard morning of sleeping until lunch time.

Weird is not being able to see something that is straight in front of your face.

Puh-lease. Spare me the lecture.

So me and my weirdness will just be over here living my best weird life being Mrs Weird of Weirdsville.

I would really love to hear what word your teens use to describe you as a mum? And if it’s “loving and kind” you can quietly go and live on Liar Island with the pizza guy.

Come at me fellow Weird mums. I can’t be living in Weirdsville alone?

Yours forever in the gloriousness of weird.


M

Operation Secret iPod Confiscation – The jig is up.

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For the punters playing along at home….

The cat  is out of the bag.

The can of worms has popped.

The beans have been spilled.

The game has been given away.

Mr. Hooch couldn’t help himself. Damn him.

Let’s just say there’ll be some more literary pursuits occurring in the top bedroom.

Operation Secret iPod Confiscation has officially concluded.

The results are hazy.

(If you have no idea what I’m talking about.. head on back to the last post “Liar Liar Pant on Fire”).

I’m sure when she is 25 years old and I give her the iPod back, she will appreciate the life lessons I am trying to instill. Yeah, that’s right, TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OLD…. I actually said that. It’s OK though because, by the time I got to that part of my monologue, I’m pretty sure her eyes were rolled so far back into her head it had turned off her ability to hear.

While I was imparting my wisdom upon the pony-tail wearer, there was a little 7 year old loving the absolute shit out of seeing his sister getting ripped a new butt-hole. It wasn’t ripping actually….more like a carefully planned surgical incision. He had a surgical butt-hole procedure only last week, so he was simultaneously tender and gleeful as he watched on with eyes as big as saucers.

As our daughter made her way back to her room, with her new butt-hole, to spend some time “reflecting”, or possibly making a voodoo doll with red curly hair, I wondered if my stealth operation had any more value than pure entertainment for myself. This parenting gig is hard, and I’m lucky because my kids are pretty awesome kids. I have probably made Miss iPod sound like a right little turd, but she’s not. She is the bees knees and despite my rant, I, of course, adore her. She is kind, smart, clever and reliable. She is thoughtful and caring. But she’s also a kid, learning her way through childhood at the same time we are learning our way through parenthood. How’s that for twisted irony? I am the first one to stick my hand up and recognise that I stuff this job up all the time. If I had a boss, I’d be on a permanent Performance Management Plan, mainly for inappropriate language I suspect.

I hope something gets through to them when I launch my monologues of wisdom. I hope some kind of lesson was learned, or re-learned. I hope for so many things for our children.

Mainly, I hope they don’t turn out to be raging morons.

I hope they turn out to be good eggs – honest, kind and thoughtful.

I hope they know their worth.

I hope they live a life of purpose and meaning.

I hope they have back-bones and speak their truth.

I hope they find happiness.

The list is endless.

But mostly, I hope they know they are loved, because, without that, nothing else matters.

M