A Moment of Kindness??

     Last week I was walking with the two young adults who are currently at home.  We were stopped at the corner of a busy intersection waiting for the light to change, when a car full of teenagers also stopped at the light.  One of the young men in the back seat of the car called out to us, "Hello!"  

    I said "Hello," in response.  

    He then said, "You're beautiful!" to which I responded, "Thank you.  So are you!" and then the light changed and we all moved on.

    My youngest turned to me and said, "Mom, he was being sarcastic and mean."  

    I said, "How do you know that?"

    "I know it because he is the same age as the kids at my school and that's how they are."

    Hm.  Perhaps my daughter did not believe a teenage boy could possibly think I was beautiful. Perhaps the boy was referring to my two kids when he said, "you are beautiful," in which case, the "thank you" still held for me: "thank you for seeing the beauty in my progeny."  Still, I would be lying if I said that the same thought that maybe he was just being sarcastic and mean had not crossed my mind as well.  Perhaps when they drove off they all had a good laugh.  Maybe. But several things occur to me.  

    First of all, we can't paint everyone, including boys of a certain age, with the same brush.  It isn't healthy for us to stereotype or prejudge others.  Assuming others' motives is not helpful for anyone.  

    Secondly, once again I had a choice about how to see or frame this situation.  I could have chosen to be hurt by his "meanness."  I could have chosen to discount him as "just a kid being unkind because that's what boys of a certain age do when they are with their friends."  Or I could choose, as I did, to be bolstered and uplifted by the kind words of a stranger.  There is a wise 12-step saying, "It's none of my business what you think of me."  What is my business is how I am treated and how I choose to respond to the treatment that comes my way.  I choose to take kindness at face-value and to appreciate those moments when good is offered by strangers, whatever the thinking behind it might be.

    Finally, I was saddened by my youngest child's cynical view of the world.  I asked her, "So, are all your friends at school mean like that?"

    "Well, no," she said.

    "Then why would you assume that these kids were being mean?"

    "Well, my friends would not have said anything to a stranger."

    "Then that is their loss, isn't it?  If you have an opportunity for kindness, I would hope that you and your friends would take it, even if that moment of kindness is being offered to a stranger."

    I am troubled by this conversation.  Are we raising cynical children who expect unkindness, maybe especially from their peers?  Perhaps her expectation protects her when cruelty comes.  But also, sometimes people rise to the level of expectation.  And if we expect our teenage boys, in particular, to be cruel won't that expectation inevitably encourage them to be just that?  What if, instead, we expected them to be polite, respectful, to go the extra mile to be kind?  

    As I have often said, I believe we tend to project out onto others our own thoughts, feelings and behaviors.  So my conversation with Youngest continues.  I want her to take the opportunities to uplift all those around her, even strangers.  Perhaps if it were habitual in her own behavior, she would not be so cynical about expecting others to behave in the same way.  

    My youngest may be right and again, the boy in the car may have been having a laugh at my expense.  But I do not choose to be brought down by that.  Instead, I choose to take in the words, "You are beautiful" from a stranger and to pass them back, "So are you!"  It made my day brighter, regardless of my daughter's interpretation.  

Those hard parenting moments

        My eldest child is late to enter the "teens" officially.  What I mean by that is that the typical behaviors we associate with teenagers: rebelliousness, trying on different selves, bonding more with friends than with family, believing themselves to be so much smarter and more knowledgeable than their elders - my eldest has been late to arrive here.  But she is here now.  Oh boy, is she here now.  As a result, while my eldest is now officially "in her 20s", in reality, I have three teenagers.  And with COVID, it is a 24/7 kind of a deal.  There's no escaping this.  I can't go away for a weekend, or send one of them to spend the night at a friend's house.  Eldest should be away for her junior year at college, but she's been home now for almost a year and will no doubt continue through the summer at this point.  And while each of the kids can escape to their own room, there is no place for me to escape to.  I share my room, and my husband claims it during the day for his work space.  I'm in the common space then, and so when the teenagers are out in that space expressing their "teenage-dom", it is me who gets the full blast of it.  

      Don't get me wrong: for the most part I really enjoy my family.  I not only love each of them, but I truly LIKE each of them as well.  I have found myself grateful most of the time for the weird gift of this time when I get to be around them more, get to really be together with kids who will be gone all too soon.  And truly, for the most part my kids are very nice, interesting people.  They are caring and growing and learning and often still respect what I have to say, still value me as their parent.  But while this is mostly true, there are moments when the teenage attitude is utterly too much to deal with.  When I wake up to sarcasm, sass, and criticism, being told that they don't want me to talk to them at all, even when they are in the same room as me, when they pull away if I put my hand on their shoulder and shrug me off, when they clearly are trying to push my buttons and set me off - all of it when I can't step away easily, when there just isn't a place for me to escape to, sometimes it can simply be hard to take.  This behavior was hard to take when it began, but over this year long period it has become increasingly so.  

      I read an article recently that basically said that parents need to let teenagers act out in these horrible ways at home because they are "trying these things on" and if you allow them to behave this way at home, to act out their stress using you as their punching bag, that they will avoid behaving this way in public where it could truly damage relationships.  It went on to say that parents should, therefore, just put up with it, be graceful in the face of abuse because teens need to know that home is a safe place where they can act out their stress, and just be freely themselves without any risk or loss. 

     I call BULL on that article.  Absolute bull.  By accepting that kind of behavior, you teach a child that it is acceptable to be cruel and unkind to their loved ones.  We give them the false belief that there are no consequences to lashing out in inappropriate ways towards those who love them.  We teach them that elder-abuse (even verbal abuse) is somehow okay.  We also know that being a teenager is in many ways like being a toddler: their job is to push on the boundaries and figure out where they are.  It is, therefore, important that they actually find those edges, are given those boundaries, and are reminded that certain behaviors are not okay.  Being unkind is not okay now, or later, or ever; it's not okay with strangers, not with friends, and not even with family.  

    That doesn't mean that I will respond to their bad behavior with rejection or revenge.  We have to model appropriate responses to unkindness.  We have to model who we want them to choose to be.  But I also am not going to just sit by and allow the unkindness.  I will point it out.  "I really felt hurt when you made that comment."  I will protect myself.  "It isn't okay to say things in ways that intentionally hurt other people.  There are alternatives to expressing oneself with sarcasm and judgement, which are hurtful."  I will give them alternative ways to respond, "I would have had an easier time hearing that if you'd phrased it differently.  Perhaps in this way..."  I will help them to be self-reflective, "I'm wondering why you felt you needed to say that and why you chose to say it in that way.  Can you explain it better to me?"  And at times, I will just take myself for a walk because I need the break from it all.

     Most of all, I will just breathe...

     I don't get it right all the time.  My responses are not always those I want.  And when they aren't, that also gives me a chance to model apologizing and naming what I should have done differently in response as well.  It also allows me to model gentleness with myself and self-forgiveness, as well as forgiveness for their behaviors.   Some days that's easier.  Some days that's harder.  

    This "living with teens" is giving me a lot of opportunity to grow.   

    One day at a time, folk.  One day at a time...