Being the Sunday through Thursday parent comes with a certain amount of responsibility. I'm the "take-no-prisoners-you-will-get-in-bed-or-you-will-not-see-a-computer-for-three-days" parent. But Zac makes it easy to parent, even when I have to be a hardass. We went to one of his classmates' parties today and I realized raising Zac is a little like raising a male version of myself as a child. We went to Jumping Jungle, a local indoor fun house filled with bouncy air houses. After 45 minutes of ear piercing screams, balls, and running like a madman, Zac came down and sat in my lap. First, he did the classic kid thing of asking for money for the arcades (no) and if he could use my phone to play Angry Birds (no). Then he complained about how bored he was. "It's boring to just run around and scream," he complained. I told him the rest of his friends were having fun and maybe he should try it.
Then Zac looked under the air hockey table and found a beaten up game of Sorry. In the middle of the party, he pulled out the pieces and I looked over and saw this:
and I thought...he's just...me. I'm raising a nerd, and a gamer, and a book reader because I was once all those things. We both read every night before bed and my biggest threat to him is that I won't read another chapter in one of his books if he misbehaves.
He's just the best kid. He's funny, thoughtful, and smart as hell. When he asked me when kids would stop being mean to him for his lackluster social skills, I bluntly told him, "college" because I don't know how to raise a social kid because I'm not a social parent. So, he and are stuck together. Slowly making our way in the world. Learning and growing at each turn. I guess that's the benefit of both being nerds: if we can't figure something out, we can always google it.
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