Wow…did a decade just go by?
That’s what goes through my mind as I sit in the chair circle in front of the check out counter in the middle of Hollister (the clothing store for the young California-want to be hipster teens and twenty somethings). The store smells great, but they have sprayed more cologne in the place than the whole class of 2010 senior girls and guys can ever wear. I don’t mean to be offensive, just calling it like I see it. Shoot, I wish I was a young California-want to be hipster teen or twenty something. Instead, I’m 42-year-old sitting because my knee is swollen to the size of a baby pig and my back is aching from a half day of manual labor yesterday old feeling dude. I am waiting on my sixteen year old as he picks out a couple of items with his Chistmas gift card.
My age becomes very apparent to me and the ages of the people running this store blows me away. I feel surrounded, surrounded by people less than half my age or more. OMG, there isn’t an adult running the store, or at least it doesn’t look like it.
Why only a decade ago these people were having their clothes purchased for them from GYMBOREE! There’s little Bobby with a Cheerio stuck up his nose and little Susie with more Goldfish in her mouth than teeth. Caroline has thrown her juice cup (sippy cup) across the store and hit an elderly gentleman in the back of the head.
Back then, clothes were easy. They all wore the same pattern clothes, only the colors and designs were different between the boys and the girls. And the smell in the store wasn’t cologne. Well, not unless it was MIDNIGHT PASTURE #2.
A decade ago we were putting them in a stroller or a car seat. Now, we sit in the passenger side of the car yelling and screaming at them, so says my sixteen year old. You ain’t seen yelling yet boy! Now everything we do and say is to SAVE THEIR LIFE! “Don’t wear that! I’m trying to SAVE YOUR LIFE!” “Don’t drive like that! I’m trying to SAVE YOUR LIFE!” “Don’t eat like me. I’m trying to SAVE YOUR LIFE!”
You know, it’s hard being a parent and making it through a decade. I admire those who have made it entirely through parenthood. I can’t believe I made it through a decade and a half of it. What will we do next? How are we going to prepare them more for what’s to come once they are out on their own? They only have a couple of years and it seems like they are muting us more and more. YIKES!!! HELP!!! What an awesome responsibility. I feel an extreme urge to apologize to my parents right now. Sorry Mom and Dad!
Yep, just sitting here, I know he could care less what I think about his choice in clothes, my advice on how to drive, my comments regarding grades, anything regarding girls and just everything in general.
“What’s that?”
Sorry….I have to go. It seems my little boy….I mean my son wants my opinion on something before he buys it.
God…Father…help me to major on the majors and minor on the minors. I only have one shot at this with my two boys and I want to be more to them, like you are to me. May Dana and I, always look to You continuously for Fatherly wisdom and not our own earthly logic. By the way, thank you so much for the past decade…..