One on One Time with Your Kids…Amazing What You Learn

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Today I had lunch with my little guy. He’s not really so little anymore, on the verge of being a teenager. I don’t often get to spend one on one time with any of the kids, unless you count driving them to practice or a game. So it was kind of a treat.

At first it was hard to try to get him to talk. “I’m bored,” he told me as we were waiting for our food. “Well,” I said, “If we talk, you won’t be bored.”  Since he gave me nothing to work with, I thought I’d try asking him if he’d get his hair cut. Probably wasn’t the best topic of discussion, since for some reason he loves that “long, in your face” look that my husband and I can’t stand but causes a huge fight anytime we suggest cutting it. I’ve come to the conclusion it’s just not worth the battle. I have bigger fish to fry. Plus, my oldest went through that stage too, and now he can’t stand long hair. So anyway, he shrugged and said “Sure.” Now I’m thinking to myself, how fast can I get him to the barber before he changes his mind! He was just playing with me though. He gave me this impish little grin and said, “Well, someday.” Ugh.

So then I decided maybe we could talk about books, and I asked him if he’s reading anything good right now. All of my kids like to read but my two younger ones are notorious for reading things that are not normally what kids their age would choose to read. We have a ton of books in the house for him to choose from. He answered in this cryptic way that he has a habit of doing, “I’m reading something that was written in the 1300’s.” Ok, that helps me! There’s no way I could even begin to guess! So then he informed me that he’s reading Dante’s Inferno, which is about Hell. Seriously? This is what he’s reading? I know it’s a classic, but that’s about it. He’s reading it on his iPad…I think he bought it on iBooks on an account he shares with his brother and my husband. I checked Amazon to find out more about it, and one of the reviews was written by a 13 year old kid who liked the book so much that he recommended it to anyone who can read. I’ve never read it, but according to my son, it’s a really good book.

It’s probably not so odd that he would choose to read something like this. He’s watched the history channel and documentaries practically his whole life. He’s drawn to that stuff. He’s a sponge and can spout back completely obscure information for a kid his age, complete with his own opinion, right or wrong…like why reverse mortgages don’t make sense to him. And yet, he can be a complete goof ball too, laughing ridiculously about the different farting sounds he can get a whoopee cushion to make.

I need to make time to do this more often. It was quite an interesting lunch…I  learned a lot today.