Teens these days - so they say

[GoldenRivet]

A man is entitled to an ever shrinking number of things in this world. Near as i am aware, expression of his opinions is still one of them, for now. So heres mine.

I never had a lot demanded of me as a kid growing up. Sometimes my dad would drag me out of bed at 730am on a Saturday to help him mow or weedeat, throw hay, stack bags of shavings, or fix a tractor. Or he would put me to work helping him put up a chain link fence, or a split rail fence, or repair this thing or that. Sometimes he wouldnt, sometimes he would leave me to my frivolous time wasting. I whined and moaned about it when he asked, but generally i got up and did it. I wasnt very good at it. yeah sometimes i nicked the vinyl siding, dented a downspout or two... or messed it all up some other way leaving him with more problems than he had at the start of it all. Yeah, sometimes he would lay into me for bringing the wrong tool "Dammit you wouldnt know a crescent wrench from a left titty!", or maybe he'd get onto me for holding the flashlight incorrectly "Son if i ever wanted to look at the back of my head in the dark i know just who to call!" The man was an expert at making you feel about an inch tall for screwing up the job... then, when it was all over, and we would behold 200 feet of fresh fence, and he would make you feel like a mountain just for having been a part of the payoff.

Thing is, the old man never needed any help with that crap, he was perfectly good at doing it on his own. Hell... i think for him it was down right theraputic sometimes to just find random thing to work on. Growing up that never made a lot of sense to me. But sooner or later as i got older i figured out that the old man was trying to teach me one thing or another, even if i was almost too damned thick to learn it.

You see... he knew that one day, i would be a grown man. I'd have to wake up at 5am, and go do a bunch of stuff i hated, so i could feed a family. He knew that one day, id be covered in more dirt and sweat by 9am than i cared to think about so i could keep the mortgage covered for another month. He knew that the alternative was that i could grow up to be a layabout, who bemoaned waking up before sunrise, who couldnt install a sink, or replace a missing shingle, or change a flat tire or do one darned thing worthwhile. and then what use would i be?

So what did i get out of all that?

plenty really... but primarily I learned that you can fish, or you can cut bait... but you cant just liesurely ride the boat.

I think thats part of why it sends me over the absolute edge when i see someone just sitting there, whiling away the hours staring off into space daydreaming, napping while there are things... important things within arms reach to be done, and there they sit, idle as an old mossy log.

I am pleased, often, to go out to the airfield at 630am, and meet some 16, 17, or 18 year old kid, eager to tackle the day. I ask "did you study that thing i asked you to study?" and they snap out a firm "yes sir!" and i ask four or five questions about the subject and their answers float on confidence through the air and my ears receive the correctness with delight.

What is it that makes some youngn's possess that drive? that desire to rise, hit the shower, and try to see if they can conquer the whole Earth by lunch? What grit is stored within their guts to cause them to be that way? is it their parenting? is it their lineage? are they smarter? dumber?

Really... i dont care why they have it. Why they have it doesnt matter. it just matters that they do.

What i really wanna know is... why are others so content to just lay beneath the shade tree with strawgrass between their teeth, and they sit with absolutely not one desire or ambition in the world except to simply linger there?

I scratch my head on it... but i damn sure know who im putting my money on, and my faith in, when the chips are down and everything is on the line.

Of particular trouble is my own teen. I grow tired, frustrated, annoyed, and downright angry when i come home for a late lunch at 230pm most days, and find her still asleep in bed.

18 years old, no job, no plan, no ambitions, school work is at the very bottom of the list. and always always always really sleepy for someone who slees 14 hours. Of course, i'm the step dad, so what in the hell right do i have to say anything? and when i do... well, i get a full broadside from both of the broads in my house.

over it