Parents normally complain that it is most difficult to deal with teenagers: that they are stubborn, defy their parents, live in their own world and dress in the most outlandish manner not to speak of having their own peculiar language. But once you know some simple truths about teens in general, it becomes very easy to understand them.
Note: The post has been written about boys for obvious reasons, but it applies equally to girls.
Here is a brief guide:
Words have different meanings in their and our dictionaries. For instance, take the word ‘where’. When we use it we mean to ask about the destination or place, as in ‘Where are you going?’ or ‘Where were you till now?’ In the dictionary of the teens, the word becomes silent. Since it doesn’t exist, they don’t hear it – at all.
The key word is ‘hear’. They don’t hear it only when we say it. For their part, they liberally use it; in fact it is the inevitable preface to all their sentences, as in ‘where is my shirt/comb/pen?’ They usually don’t speak anything other than ask for where something or the other is, so it is a key word in their vocabulary.
The word weird likewise means two different things. When they dye their hair purple or wear a huge peace sign round their necks, they are just being ‘cool’. The older brat came home once from college, the hair at the back of his head cut in a neat olodum! But when you wear a kurta with jeans, you are ‘weird.’ You might as well be wearing a grass skirt and tank top.
A vital aspect of the teen years is communication — or the lack of it. Simply put, they don’t want to communicate. I swear we had taught both the brats how to talk and answer questions when they were young! But I don’t know what went wrong and why they stopped talking, rather ‘didn’t want to talk about it’.
Ask them about their studies and they reply, ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ Tell them that their room is a mess and they loftily say, ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ If you want to know why their grades are slipping, they impatiently utter, ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ So what DO they want to talk about? Well, nothing at least to their old folks.
And when they do deign to talk, it is an unintelligible mumble. My first born has this wonderful speech he uses when addressed by one of his parents, in which you can’t decipher a single syllable, leave alone a word. He’d have answered you and so you can’t blame him for ignoring you. The best part is that he walks AWAY from you when he replies and God save you if you ask him to repeat what he just mumbled. You’d get an earful about how you NEVER listen to what he says. When you pin him down for having done something without your permission or knowledge, he would simply stick to his, ‘I did tell you, but you NEVER listen to what I say, anyway.’
They are expert at giving you all sorts of complexes. For instance, you hear him talk on the phone in a whisper, so low that you can’t catch a single word even if you are just a foot away. I bet I couldn’t have heard him had I been at the other end. Now you begin wondering— about your own hearing — may be you need a hearing-aid?
If this is the older one, the younger one has his own ways of (non)communication. You ask him about his school/studies/friends/anything else, and you would get a stock reply: ‘I am not in the mood to talk now.’
If you persisted, you would get a pained expression and a martyred look: ‘Ok, what do you want to know?’
You would desist from asking him anything after that performance unless your skin was as thick as rhino hide. The only problem is that you never manage to get him in a good mood to talk. But to be fair, he sometimes, would take pity on one of us and ask very sweetly, ‘So what was it that you were asking?’, a long time after the original question had been asked, knowing fully well that we would have forgotten all about it!
These ruses by the brats sometimes caused fights between the L&M and me because we each thought that they behaved differently with the other. Till one day, as the older one walked AWAY answering me, the L&M turned incredulously to me and said, ‘He does that with you too?’ And another day, as the younger one gave his father his martyred look, I blurted out, ‘I thought he talked to you!‘ I am sure the brats were giving us looks of pity behind our backs.
Just as you begin to wonder if you’ve given birth to deaf and mute boys, and the talking baby/kid had been a figment of your imagination, a horde of his friends descend upon you and he simply can’t stop talking. As I said before, if you are not careful, this can give you a massive inferiority complex!
Meal times can be confounding. He doesn’t want to eat anything as he is ‘fit to burst’ or is ‘not hungry’. ‘I’ll drink some juice if I feel hungry,’ he tells you.
But that is before you tell him that you are planning to order out a pizza. Viola! his appetite returns like a boomerang. ‘Make it a large, ma,’ he instructs you briskly, running to pick up the menu and make his selection. You can’t question him unless you want to hear his reply “I don’t want to talk about it.”
In teen parlance, night = day. Their day begins when ours ends. This has earned the older one the nickname of ‘Nishacharan’ (one who walks at night aka a demon :)) from me. Sometimes he falls asleep in the bolt upright position. He’d have a book open on his lap, the walkman/ipod plugged in his ears, with the TV blaring away and he’d be blissfully travelling the land of the nod. If you woke him up, he’d say that he was concentrating on his studies and merely ‘looked’ to be asleep, all without batting an eyelid. Of course this is but another instance of your misunderstanding the teen.
The ear for music is likewise different for the teens and us:
When they sit with the music system blaring at a mere 1000 watts ostensibly concentrating on a complex math problem, it is actually ‘helping them to study.’ But when you turn up the volume a tad because you are in the kitchen and can’t hear the song playing in the living room, you are disturbing the entire household and making it ‘impossible to study.’
It is to be ‘with it’ to listen to classical singers sing Indipop songs. They are ‘rad’, but if they sing genuine classical music (for which they have trained for years), they are ‘oh-so-boring.’ ‘Why are they wailing so, ma?’ they’d scream from their rooms.
Let me warn you though. Before you know it, he has left home. Then you suddenly begin getting calls at all odd hours. You are concerned. : ‘Oh, nothing ma, called just like that,’ he would say. In the next ten minutes you would get to hear of the squirrel that had entered the chemistry lab and the havoc it had wreaked, or simply about how he drank the most divine milkshake in one of the ice cream parlours near his college. Inane things, mundane happenings — things and events that would not merit a long distance call. At least not from someone who till recently ‘didn’t want to talk about it’.
It then hits you — he is not the mature adult he has been trying to project himself as, but the child who is missing familiar things and his folks and just wants to hear a familiar voice, so what if it is that of his old cybermom.
Note that the communication part is still missing. You scarcely have a serious conversation even now, but at least he called, didn’t he? Well so be glad you have a son(s)/daughter(s) who have their hearing and speech intact and their heart in its right place, too!
The Cybernag 
Lovely! I know the feeling … Been there, heard that!! Dad of a 22-year old brat that I am! 🙂
They can drive you crazy, run rings around you and make you wonder at times why you have to put up with it!!
But then it is fun and worth it, right down to the very last minute of madness.
Don’t we deserve an award for surviving the experience and for preserving our sanity .. No jokes!
I love reading your articles. One gets the sense of being-there.
LikeLike
Thank you Jayadev for reading and liking my posts. The reason we go through it is because we know they are not half the brats that we say they are 🙂 And yes, we deserve more than an award for putting up with them. In fact, I am inclined to believe that we all sport an invisible halo around our long suffering heads 😀
LikeLike
somehow it makes me feel guilty by making me think how i behaved with mom dad. whattay post ji.bang on!
LikeLike
But the posts are meant to revive nostalgia, not send the readers on a guilt trip because the parents have many regrets about the way they must have dealt with their teens too, ask me 🙂 So relax!
LikeLike
great efforts
LikeLike
u are talking about teenagers, but the way things are at home, u might have been talking of my 8 yr old!!! almost all ths happens right here right now!!! so u can imagine what might be in store in the next few years!!
LikeLike
I keep hearing this thing about kids behaving like teens already, but that’s because we are giving them that kind of freedom to be themselves, something those from the earlier generation lacked. You can bet your last paisa that it will keep getting betterer and betterer as Samhith grows older. Cheers 😀
LikeLike
Great post.
I haven’t got a teen-aged kid. But from the ones I have seen in my apartment, I can relate to your post.
ipod plugged in ears – that’s the thing I am talking about. How can you be hanging and talking with your friends if all of you have ipods plugged in your ears. Really!
LikeLike
Don’t be too complacent. Today’s adorable toddler is tomorrow’s confounding teenager. So be warned and prepared. The best thing would be to dip into your own teen years for help 😀
LikeLike
What a lovely post, Zephyr. 🙂 You could have been describing one of my brothers and now my niece. It very true that such behaviour is not restricted only to boys, and it depends on the personality. My niece has metamorphosed from a chatty, communicative child into a sullen, uncommunicative stranger. But flashes of her “hidden” personality keeps slipping out and reassuring us. 🙂
A close friend’s 18-year old is just the reverse. He loves talking, discussing his future and plans with us and loves going out with his family and relatives. My friend and her family are worried if he is a normal teenager at all 🙂
LikeLike
LOL Now normal is in the danger of being termed abnormal 🙂 Like Pratibha in her comment says, her children wouldn’t shut up. Maybe she is a better mother than me 😦 But overall, teens are simply confused and act the introvert and extrovert alternately, just as the confusion or the lifting of it overtakes them, I guess. At least that used to be the case with me. Ah yes, I was a teenager too once, even if it might be hard to believe 🙂
LikeLike
Wow.. very well written. An interesting take on Teen talk and behavior. Loved it and I would say I agree. 🙂 Teens live in a different world altogether. Teen parlance: Night = Day: Hilarious! Nice humor and lots of lessons to be learnt as well. 🙂
LikeLike
The problem is, we forget the lessons we learn when we should remember them the most. But never mind, we get paid in our own coin by time. 😀
LikeLike
Whoa! how did I manage to miss this gem. And I was always under the impression that there’s not a single post of yours I have missed.
It sparkles and bubbles with your wit. Loved it 🙂
LikeLike
Thanks Purba. 🙂
LikeLike
Absolutely hilarious! I was smiling all the way 😀 But I do think I have picked up quite a few lessons here as well.. 🙂
LikeLike
As a parent of a kid (not yet a teen) I was hoping to end the post with some pancea.. unfortunately got none. Does that go one to say that one has to learn to enjoy it much though we cannot change it 😀
Its hard for me to believe I would have troubled my parents during my teens, much though it wasnt the easiest of phases. IMO one tends to get much more closer to parents in late twenties – some of the best times with my dad was then. I wish as teenagers we could understand and appreciate our parents a bit more and at same time wonder why parents wouldnt just let the kids grow up.. i still have to fight with my mom for allowing me to behave like a grown up man. 🙂
Loved the post Z, have nt been much regular on your blog off late.. but am so glad i came back on this one. Did i miss something ! will catch up again.
LikeLike
You got it! Be prepared and learn to enjoy the time since you can’t change it. We learn to appreciate out parents as we grow older and sometimes that comes pretty soon. why don’t you ask your mother how you were as a teen? The points of contention varies between children, parents, cultures and regions. but some amount of clashes is bound to be there. As for mothers, they have a hard time accepting that their children have grown up into adults 😀
I have missed you here too. Do visit more often. 🙂
LikeLike
How I identify with this post…They are never in a mood to talk…and we keep searching for that right time, when they will open their hearts…Girls are better perhaps, they share but boys create this mood dependent wall which breaks only when I order pizza….It s not that they dont care…they just dont communicate…wonder why?
Brilliant observation.
LikeLike
I think it is just the individual child and has nothing to do with the sex. I have seen girls who built this wall and boys who were free and open to talking. But in general, teenage is a tumultuous time and there are bound to be fireworks between the two generations.
LikeLike
Brought back so many memories. Wonderful post
LikeLike
I am glad it did Bhagya!
LikeLike
Zephyr absolutely luurve these Parenting posts of yours!!
Experience always makes a Mom read between the lines 🙂
LikeLike
Thanks Varsha. I had started writing these when the older one was about 13 or 14. And went on adding them. Of late I have written more on the L&M and me since we two are alone now and so have more fodder 😀
LikeLike
This is so so cute and wonderful! My son is not a teenager just as yet, but I can quite imagine how he would be when he is one :). I have two sons too, and I often wonder why when they are told to do something, they become deaf. But, whisper that they can do something of their choice and they can hear it over the TV volume :). Ah, it brings a smile to my face. My son is almost 10, and I was lamenting to my hubby that in a few years he will be off from home, and I would desperately look forward to his return home :). My hubby said that just now you were cribbing of what a brat he is. I said yes with a smile :). That’s the way we parents are!
LikeLike
Like R’smom says, kids behave like teenagers when they are so little. But parenting is all about the khatta meetha moments and we savour both with equal zest. And of course miss them once they leave home. but then it is also a two-sided thing, the missing part, I mean 🙂
LikeLike
Superb narration and gave me a lot of deja vu moments! The smile refused to leave my face till I finished reading!
Brilliant!
LikeLike
Thank Deepak. I am glad it gave you some happy moments 🙂
LikeLike
So well written and this seriously is a gem, worth re-posting several times! Now, wondering if I was so difficult as a teenager 🙂
LikeLike
We all are difficult as teenagers. Ask my mother 🙂 Don’t give me ideas about reposting — I will take you up on your words and do it again when I am stuck for a topic.
LikeLike
Well, if it is worth repeating, why not? 🙂 I recently read the post on your Maths Teachers and am sure that is a good candiate for re-posting too.
Now, do you want me to go through your archives and pick “re-posting worthy” ones? Ain’t I a good girl? *fluttering eyes*
LikeLike
You sure are! I was wondering who was reading all those posts 🙂 My poor maths teachers. I feel so genuinely sorry for them after four decades and more!
LikeLike
Hellos 🙂
Nicely written. It always refreshes me between the work.
Its a diff perspective all together. I was all enthu to leave mom n go to thatha patti s house for engineering. I was all excited. Didnt understand mom s emotions that time, and it didnt take much time before the phone bills shot up.
Cheers!!!
LikeLike
It will be different because I have written from the other side of the fence 🙂 But if it helped you to connect with your own teen years, I am glad. btw., on whose side the phone bills shoot up, yours or mom’s?
LikeLike
I can so imagine my mom saying almost these same things about me! Not giving her proper answers, listening to music while doing Maths and Accounts – and yes, it really did help me concentrate! Talking weirdly to her when dad wasn’t around and behaving like a complete angel when he was 😛
Damn! Just how much I must’ve troubled her, and still do! But I know she loves me a lot , even more than my brother! Love you ma!
And a lovely post CyberNag! Thanks for taking me back into my teenage days 🙂
LikeLike
Thanks for the comment Amreen. All of us have been a pain for our parents during our teenage years. The issues would have been different but the generation gap is unmistakably there. The relationship between a mother and teenage daughter can be even more stormy as I have seen in many cases including mine 🙂 But love overrides everything not only the parents’ but the childrens’ too as you can vouch, I am sure. Glad you enjoyed a trip down memory lane. 🙂
LikeLike
I have 2 sons aged 15 and 13 – imagine my plight 😦 I can co relate each and every word- oh my thoroughly enjoyed your wonderful style of writing!
LikeLike
Two sons as teenagers? At least in my case since the age difference was six years, by the time the second one became one, the older had left home, but he was also a moody preteen so it was like having two teenagers. But before you know it, they would have flown the coop. So make the most of it 🙂
LikeLike
Aiyo this is so so funny Zephyr…you are a rockstar..and your sons are so cute 🙂
My mom would so agree to this..and oh wait..its not only teen…I think they start early now…I have communication problems with R 🙂
LikeLike
As teenagers they were anything but cute as I suspect all teenagers are. As my mother, She will have tales of horror to tell about me as a teenager 😀 It is indeed true that kids are becoming teenagers even as toddlers. Read the comment by Imps Mom.
LikeLike
[…] “Oh, yes, Dad!” they called out from the living room. It is a mystery to me how they can hear a question asked in the most normal tone from that far, when they can’t hear me when I am shouting myself hoarse calling the one or the other to do some chore. I guess it is what one would call selective hearing. (Tricky teen-talk) […]
LikeLike
I have a toddler on her way to 4 yrs n i have already been thru the jeans n kurta bit…the i dont wanna talk abt it..the mood swings..I used to call it her teenage years in toddlerhood till I read this. And it brought back memories..of the way i was with my mum. :)) she doesnt call having children ur karma for nuthin..sigh..
Bottom Line: Loved your blog, ( ur son led me here btw) n loved the name – cyber nag. 🙂
definitely bookmarked for further reading. 🙂
LikeLike
Welcome here Imps Mom! Thanks for the nice comment and for bookmarking me! 🙂
If children are our karma, well I am glad for the good karma I must have done! Look at me, where would my blog be without my brats? 😀
Your blog name says it all.Earlier it used to be the adolescents that were acting like teens and now even toddlers are catching up! My daughter-in-law says that my not yet two granddaughter already behaves like a teenager! what next? 🙂
LikeLike
You did it again girl……hit the nail on the head i.e…. in your inimitable style ! Made me laugh out loud while reading your post ! It’s amazing how well you put across what most of us feel/go through……! Awesome posting !
LikeLike
Thanks Chits!
LikeLike
That was very interesting. I could empathize, having brought up two brats myself. 🙂
LikeLike
Thanks for the comment Shail. Teens are not only universal in their behaviour but also are the same over the generations! We should know, right? 😀
LikeLike
The now grandmoms in the family have been through a lot no? The V’s & S’s have been pretty cruel to them. Maybe the little girls will read these posts in about 10 years and be easier on us?? Wishful thinking haha… Happy Mother’s day mami
You and VInni have inspired me…I’m going to revive my writing soon.
LikeLike
History always repeats itself and the generation gap can never be bridged. the now grandmoms are waiting to see the day when this generation faces the same music! thanks for the mother’s day wish.
Another blogger in the family? can’t wait to read your stuff. i always used to say that you have a way with words. Start sooooon!
LikeLike
oi ma,
Unfortunately i dont seem to have grown out of the teenage years yet! Still do the nodding off while reading or watching tv bit.
Still stay up late and through the night … Only am working instead of driving around town.
The peace symbol was something else wasn’t it? I had to educate the local barber for a good half hour before he got the idea. He never understood why anyone would do that but used to tell all his customers about it for a long time after that!
Through all the ‘dont want to talk about it’ s, you have to grant us one thing. We always told you the important stuff.
– vikki
LikeLike
😀 Old habits die hard don’t they? hey wait, what ‘driving around?’ I thought you were careful about night driving when in college! well well…
Did the barber take a photo of the haircut? it would have added to his custom!
and yes, you did tell us about important things, even if it was many many years later, as about the ‘driving’ bit, see? 🙂
LikeLike
Its really nice to see your replies to comments. They are as interesting as the blog itself. Wants me to come back and see what you’ve said about my view!
LikeLike
Why, that’s a lovely comment Richa! Thank you. I feel that if someone is nice enough to take the time to comment on the post, I should at least make the effort to give a meaningful reply. 🙂
LikeLike
Great to have you on my blog (http://indianbaja.wordpress.com).
I must confess, I am very much impressed by your writing skills and art of storytelling. One of the best ‘Personal’ blogs I have read so far.
Visit my other blogs too :
http://indianraga.wordpress.com
and the latest, which is yet to take off :
http://indianrasa.wordpress.com
LikeLike
Thank you so much for the lovely feedback on my blog! I have bookmarked your site and will surely visit the others too! Visit again, Indianraga!
LikeLike
Hi Z would love it if you go through these in your own time and leave your views . It will help me write better. love you
http://tikulicious.wordpress.com/category/parenthood/
LikeLike
I have already commented on one post Tikuli! great stuff there. Will read more later…
LikeLike
I have a teenage bro whom I was relating with your this post…and this post indeed helped me to get better perspective towards teenagers 😉
LikeLike
Welcome here Shree! Glad to know that the post was useful 🙂 do visit again!
LikeLike
as far as i remember, my children never stopped talking. in fact they would tell each other 2 stop talking so that they could talk. even today when they come home, we sit till late in d night updating each other.
do u think i have a weird set or r they from some other planet?
LikeLike
Aaaah!!! Zephyr Mom… all mom’s are alike…. see my mom also commented twice 😉
and maa!!! wat do u meant “set”???? 😛
LikeLike
😀 Not our fault, but that of the stupid cyberspace. Words seem to vanish into black holes and then reappear in duplicate! 🙂
LikeLike
You were indeed lucky to have a set of ‘talking’ teens? 🙂 btw, did they talk amongst themselves or to you and their father?
Though to be fair, they are not always silent, only when the mood seizes them. Where else can they be themselves without worrying about making an impression, except at home? And teenage is perhaps the most difficult period in one’s life. I still remember….
LikeLike
Hey ZM, I am going to take the liberty of posting here since maa won’t be online for sometime now… we never talked among ourselves… though I am quite close to my sister we were never the sharing types 😉 and never with dad either…. as i have mentioned earlier dad is a man of few words…. we just usually love chattering abt random stuff with mom when we go back home… bandwidth becomes an issue if both of us land up at the same time… so it is almost always better for maa if we offset our travelling plans by a couple of hours at least 😀
LikeLike
Hey Siddharth, i enjoy reading ur comments!. and btw! U picked the name ZM too quick!:):) Enjoy! and have a good day!
LikeLike
Hey ridhima… u mean i picked the name ZM “too quick” or “too, quick”? cos that makes a lot of difference 😉
LikeLike
Hey Sid , i used to call her ZM which is and today i checked u also call her the same. So felt nice about it!:) So mentioned dat it’s mutual!
LikeLike
aaah got it now 🙂 ZM must be wondering why we have turned the comments area of her blogpost into a chatroom LOL 😉
LikeLike
ZM is one sweetheart! Before she writes a post on how we misuse her space lets end this! lol! ( kiddng ZM)
Cheers
Ridhima
LikeLike
😀 😀
LikeLike
Thanks for that comment in lieu of your mom’s Siddharth! i can entirely understand how hard pressed you must have been for getting her ear to share all the exciting stuff! btw, why ‘never talked among ourselves?’!!! 🙂
LikeLike
Frankly I have no answer for that…. it just turned out that way I guess… we felt more comfortable sharing with maa and since she was always around anyway there never was any need to share amongst ourselves…. guess thats y!
LikeLike
As I replied to your mom’s comment, she is a lucky maa, all right!
LikeLike
hey don’t give all the credit to her… we were lucky too 🙂
LikeLike
er.. I think I commented on the wrong post by mistake *sheepish*
LikeLike
Loved this; it’s so true – especially as I’ve brought up 7 kids. And I have to admit, I was a bit of a troublesome teen myself – was even lead guitarist in a local hard rock band 🙂
LikeLike
Wow! You sure must be an expert in raising teens then!
You were part of a rock band? 🙂
Weren’t we all the the nemesis of our parents as teens! The quirks change form but don’t disappear. come to think of it, life would be dull with boring, straight teens, wouldn’t it?
LikeLike
Absolutely amazing post. Made me remember my teen days when I became all ‘rebellious’ and I remember my mom telling some other mom, that the dreaded phase had started and she simply didnt know what to do! Apparently all the clothes that they had been buying for me all these years were suddenly terrible choices, I suddenly wanted to read no more Enid Blytons, and yeah, i remember the screaming about the phone…by my standards, I believe, i used to chat everyday for a good 2-3 hours..and mom used to tell dad that I was on phone the whole day and didnt study blah blah…well I guess, i inevitably talked more saying, in any case she has told dad I speak the entire day! Ofcourse, the I don’t wanna talk about it figured in our monologues too 🙂
LikeLike
LOL I love your logic about the phone! What about the bill though? Did your dad hit the roof when he saw it?
When I was a teen, my mother had talked to our family doctor who had then called me for a chat and tried to cousel me very subtly!!
Amma didn’t know what to do with a handful of me 🙂
LikeLike
haha…yeah, thankfully at that time, Dads company used to foot the phone bills, so i was safe 🙂 Thank God, I didn’t have any doctors or other people counselling me. I guess, the teenage just snaps out as it snaps in! so to my ma’s relief, I guess, I just fell out of that phase and we became best friends after a few years of all those furious fights! But I still like to think, she s the one who became nice and I was as I was 😀
LikeLike
It is very sweet of you to give credit to your mother for becoming nice, but the change is mostly from the child’s side, since once the adjustment period is over or as you say ‘snaps out’, things fall into perspective and there is a general calm of acceptance of oneself and one’s environments and the people inhabiting it!
LikeLike
Hey ZM , I have to say handling teenage kids is a real Game. I am thinking how ma used to handle me and my bro?. I can easily co-relate with few parts. Esp. “I dont want to talk about it”. lol.
But hey Zm we dont behave like this always, dats just the teenage. We all face these face this phase for few years and then we settle. This is the age the child wants to rebel, as he is searching his own identity He will surely express his confused behaviour, be with ” Leave me alone, Dont wanna talk right now, Some other time,” or Piercings, clinging to relationships , party’s , friends, as we feel we can relate to them most. I remember being rude with words for few years even to mom. I never meant to hurt her, but I dont know, nothing looked good to me for some time and I cud nt stand anything. Time moved on and that phase is gone!. but teenage years are really a period of confusion, of trust broken and repaired, of fluid relationships, and of low self-awareness…
I still feel how can mom’s take all this we do to them!! ( it’s wierd, after reading I feel it, though have done the same) 😉
LikeLike
Kids are welcome to be themselves with their parents. That shows their comfort level. As i told in my other replies, parents were kids and teens too! Since you are aware why you behaved in a confused manner it will make you understand it when your own teens behave like that!
LikeLike
That was indeed hilarious. Flashes of me, during my teens (the ‘cool’ dressing part) and my teenage brother (I dont want to talk about it part) went through my mind like a 3D movie while reading this post 😛
I’ve been following ‘cybernag’ for sometime and i find it immensly funny, though i always do not agree with u (nvr understand y all mom’s think alike. phew!) 😛
Waiting for ur next post 🙂
LikeLike
in fact I find it so comforting that all mom’s think and behave in the same way so i know i didn’t get a bad deal 😉
LikeLike
Thanks Anula. I am pleased that you like my posts and I am glad you finally ‘showed’ on the comments page:) I do write some serious stuff, too!
One of the things kids say to each other I am sure is, “We should not let our moms talk unsupervised!” lol
LikeLike
So true! If left unsupervised, they will totally ruin it for us! MOMS!! *rolls eyes*
LikeLike
It all flashed in front of my eyes like a horroe movie. Gosh , there should be some awards foor handling teenage boys.
lol Though I feel kurta with jeans is cool but my boys think it is only for neta types lol
My sons think that blarring metal, hard roxk and other such noisy “music ” types are way to nirvana at least they are better than everyday kich kich .. Sigh!!
I have a lot to rant on that and now that you have opened the lid , I am ready to scream.. save my soul from the terrible teens..
pssst but tell you one thing Zephyr there are some fun things I also try out with them hahah hubby thinks I am crazy woman trapped in a body of a femented teen like ywo were not enough 😀 you should see the look on his face hahahhaha
LikeLike
Oh, yes! We have to let the child and teen in us live forever to stop us from becoming dragon mothers! That’s what allows us to laugh with them and play pranks too. At home we are all trying to pull each other’s leg all the time and we never know who will align with whom!
LikeLike
I still wonder why we did the things we did. All I remember is being irritated at everything! Believe me, there is not a day when I dont regret being the way I was then. I am sorry for all the things I said or rather did not say!
But it was good having parents like you, who put up with everything.
LikeLike
And I still wonder where Vikki found that barber to cut the Olodum on the back of his head in patiala.
LikeLike
lol I can afford to laugh on hindsight, though I must confess that my stomach had churned at the time I saw it! 😀
LikeLike
Hey, did i sound like I was complaining? How could I have seen the humour in it had I been complaining, eh? Being sullen and confused as Ridhima put is, comes with the territory, so chill! 🙂
LikeLike
Pooh! ur secrets are coming out!
LikeLike
not only Pooh, but many others’ too! 😀
LikeLike
Oh yes! Wen we come to ZM i, the truth shall be unleashed! 😛
LikeLike
alright now, kurta with jeans is not weird, its quite cool and if paired well provides a good mix of the ethnic with the western (ergo not all kurtas are jeans compatible)
as far as music went, i always had a small tape recorder so would never blare too much and the stereo system was unreliable (it used to eat up the cassettes), dad got a cd player which broke down after a few months and despite all repairs refused to work without damaging the CDs. result – a generally quite household till we decided to lend our voice to it.
after i came back from college though my parents didn’t really understand the stuff I used to listen to – GnR, metallica, megadeth etc could have been aliens for all they cared except they didn’t really get it (and this from a dad who used to imitate the beatles, and mum who loves abba n the likes) and personally even I find cradle of filth to be a bit too harsh for normal hearing!! 😛
LikeLike
Oh yes, the hard rock! Wait for the post on that sometime soon! I like the ‘lending our voice’ bit. Must have been wonderful cacophony!:)
LikeLike
well, the funny bit was it would only happen when all 3 of us would be present in the house, otherwise thing would generally be quiet.
LikeLike
That’s togetherness for you! Do you still do it?
LikeLike
haven’t been to India in about 2 years now…
LikeLike
Woah Zephyr Maa…. ur on a roll here!!! posting one more gem quickly on the heels of the previous one…
As for the post, well it is a tad difficult to explain to mom what u don’t wanna talk about… it seems simpler to just say “Don’t wanna talk about it!”… of course i’m sure now that my mom would definitely have a very different story to tell…. as i see it parents miss being an integral part of their kids’ lives once the kids hit their teens… while for the kids their parents were the be-all-end-all uptil now, the friends take over very quickly and in the awkward teen years the last thing anybody wants is to be a social outcast…. thus justifying the ripped tees and jeans (or the peace symbol haircut 😉 ) just to fit in with the group….
but as we grow up we realise how much we actually miss you folks and so like the prodigal son (or daughter) come right back crawling to mom and dad to share once we leave home…. 🙂
LikeLike
Don’t I understand perfectly all those feelings? Hey, moms were teenagers too, remember? so we can relate to all the rebelliousness and stuff. It is also the time when we understand what OUR parents went through!! touche!
LikeLike
truly the circle of life…. all of us trouble our parents no end only to be paid back in kind by our next generation i guess! “and thats for not letting grandma sleep when you had the sniffles!” LOL
LikeLike
Right you are! 😀
LikeLike