Growing Edges
alexa lopezArchive for humor
Better Kid than I Was
Our oldest son turns 13 this week.
When I turned 13, I had already partaken of cigarettes (although I didn’t keep smoking them because they made me barf). Before 13, regardless whether I lived with my dad or my mom, my friends and I were sneaking out at 1:00 AM and walking to the high school to get drunk under the bleachers. We wandered around in the dark of night, being stupid.
I was such an angry person back then that I even mouthed off to my teachers and didn’t care about my grades. I hated my life, and I therefore didn’t care about others.
My neighbor across the street was a smug classmate whose smugness made me fume. So at my 13th birthday party, which was a slumber party, we waited for my mom to go do her bowling thing, and in the dark of night we took most of her Avon inventory and vandalized my neighbor’s beige house with reds and pinks and purples… Yeah, I did that.
Reggie has been anticipating this birthday for more than the mere reason that he’s turning 13, which is a big deal in itself. He is excited that he is turning 13 on the 13th, which happens to be Friday the 13th. He sees this as a sign that it’s going to be a fantastic birthday.
“Mom, can I have a couple of friends over for my Golden Birthday?” (That’s what he’s calling it).
“Sure. I’ll get to working on that,” I answered.
He knows me so well that when I say “Sure, I’ll get to that,” I forget to “get to that.”
It’s called poor mental spatial organization. Or something.
So when he heard, “Sure…” from me, he started planning his “having a couple of friends over” because he knew he’d either have to remind me numerous times to “get to that,” or that he would have to do it himself.
Which is what he did.
At first I was confused by the RSVP phone calls I started receiving. “Reggie, what are these kids RSVP-ing about?”
“My birthday party,” he answered. “I made invitations on the computer.”
“How many people are coming over?”
“Six. And they’re spending the night.” My eyes popped out of my head and dropped to the floor.
Selfish Alexa is thinking: “I have to work at 4:30 AM on Saturday, so how is that going to work with six extra boys in my home on Friday night? And when did I say Reggie could invite six boys to spend the night? And where does he expect them to sleep? And we don’t have an extra room or family room for them to have to themselves, so how do I make this fun for them? And what about Asaph, who will likely feel left out because his big brothers will be hanging out with their buddies?”I was annoyed that he went forward without consulting me along the way…
…until I realized how proud I am of him that he planned this very well, very methodically. He even told his friends not to bring video games rated “T” or above because of his little brothers…
…and until I remembered what crap I was pulling when I was his age.
I have to make this work. For Reggie.
I must not allow our “limitations” — spatial or otherwise — to mar what is a big day and a major step for him.
I’m proud of my boy….Ahem, I mean, my young man.
Oh, and we were busted for the vandalism. After my friends went home, I got to spend the whole weekend trying to get all those beautiful colors off our neighbor’s house.
© Alexa Lopez, 2009
To Laugh at (with) Oneself
I don’t know what I would do without a sense of humor about myself.
Oh, wait. Yes I do. I would do things like…well, like take everything personally.
I would probably also second guess everyone else’s motives for laughing around me. I would assume that people are laughing at me. I would believe that everyone thinks I’m a fool and a loser. I would convince myself that people — friends included — make it their purpose to crap on my day.
I would get along with nobody.
Because if I don’t laugh at myself, then nobody else is allowed to laugh at me. That’s how it goes, right?
I don’t know whether it is possible to “learn” a sense of humor about onself. I just know that if I couldn’t laugh at myself — including laughing with others when I’ve accidentally done something funny — I’d be friendless.
Because I’d be sour.
A party pooper.
This I know about me: I am a goofball, and sometimes clueless; I make careless mistakes and I sometimes don’t get the obvious jokes. For instance, I wore camouflage pants to work one day, and as he walked toward me, the Head Dude (they don’t like to be called our “bosses”) said, “Oh no! I can’t see anything but a torso!”
“What?” I asked, totally confused about what he was talking about.
“You’re wearing camouflage pants,” he said in passing.
Oh…Duh! Laughter. I shook my head as I walked on. How’d I miss that?
I wish I were funnier, quick-witted like my husband or my daughters, or like my sister Jole’, or my friend Cathy at church; I do a lot of funny things accidentally, but on purpose — not so much.
Instead, I am funny in my head.
A sense of humor is part of the art of leadership, of getting along with people, of getting things done. – Dwight D. Eisenhower
© Alexa Lopez, 2009
