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Exit Strategy
22/7/06 16:06One of the many wonderful things that has come out of Sarcasm Girl's classes at A.C.T. has been a whole new pile of new friends, and social engagements arising therefrom. And for this, we are truly grateful. However...
When a sixteen year old tells you she's taking the BART to the East Bay to see a show (and doesn't tell you what show or where, only that she's going with a bunch of A.C.T. students and someone's going to give her a lift from the BART station and they'll feed her) it is, perhaps, forgiveable of a parent to want to know how said child is going to get home. Tonight, for example, she kept being vague until the show was over, at which point several phone calls and text messages (because the phone kept dropping out) were necessary to establish that she didn't feel comfortable riding home on the BART at 11:30pm (okay, no arguments there) and that I would need to pick her up. Sigh. Of course, someone thinks that someone else has told me where I'm going, so it takes more flurries back and forth to get the address. Then, driving the 25 miles there, I realize that I don't know if I'm going to a theatre or a private house or, as the young folks, say, what. I found the street but (as it was dark and none of the houses had thoughtfully illuminated their street numbers) drove six blocks out of the way and had to double back to find the place--a private house.
In the end, I got my kid back and we drove the 27 miles back and the kid was in bed by 1 am. And the new rule chez moi is that the kid is welcome to go out--as long she has a plan for getting home in place before she leaves the house. Life is complex enough without feeling like my older kid is constantly getting us into land wars in southeast Asia.
When a sixteen year old tells you she's taking the BART to the East Bay to see a show (and doesn't tell you what show or where, only that she's going with a bunch of A.C.T. students and someone's going to give her a lift from the BART station and they'll feed her) it is, perhaps, forgiveable of a parent to want to know how said child is going to get home. Tonight, for example, she kept being vague until the show was over, at which point several phone calls and text messages (because the phone kept dropping out) were necessary to establish that she didn't feel comfortable riding home on the BART at 11:30pm (okay, no arguments there) and that I would need to pick her up. Sigh. Of course, someone thinks that someone else has told me where I'm going, so it takes more flurries back and forth to get the address. Then, driving the 25 miles there, I realize that I don't know if I'm going to a theatre or a private house or, as the young folks, say, what. I found the street but (as it was dark and none of the houses had thoughtfully illuminated their street numbers) drove six blocks out of the way and had to double back to find the place--a private house.
In the end, I got my kid back and we drove the 27 miles back and the kid was in bed by 1 am. And the new rule chez moi is that the kid is welcome to go out--as long she has a plan for getting home in place before she leaves the house. Life is complex enough without feeling like my older kid is constantly getting us into land wars in southeast Asia.