Conversations

So, I eavesdrop.

Not intentionally, mind, although sometimes I do hear things when I tune into the talking around me. Ours is one of those open concept homes, with a kitchen/kitchen eating area/living room all connected, so when folks are talking sitting at the table, or hanging out on the couches, the sound will carry. Sometimes, I will register what’s going on.

Boo and her friends (all 12 years old) were sprawled on the brown leather poofy seats in the living room early last week, reacquainted after a long summer apart. Abby, a tall outrageously outgoing girl with sandy-colored hair, played with her mp3 player and while her friends giggled, took the earbuds of her player and pushed them up her nose with the little speakers playing music all the while. Boo and Kelly, a tall dark-haired sweetie who’s been friends with Boo since kindergarten, screamed with laughter as they called me into the room.

“Mama,” they gasped. “Watch!” “Listen!”
Abby slowly opened her mouth.

The music got louder.

I chortled. I may even have guffawed. What I said was, “Abby, that was probably the strangest things I have ever seen in my life. Thank you sharing that with me!”

As I left the room, I heard Abby tell Boo, “You have the coolest Mom.”

Grin

*.*

Another thing I could not help but hear is a song my daughters came home with from camp. Camp is a place of raucous freedom and experimentation and one of the tunes they returned with had a liberal selection of the 7 words George Carlin determined, in 1971, as among the 7 words you cannot say on television. They know they are NOT to sing it anywhere around anyone who might be offended and we’ve made it clear that the song needs to get packed away very soon until next summer, along with their sleeping bags.

Boo and Monkey also came home with a classic camp song that, while not strictly offensive for those abovementioned swears, is nonetheless vividly disgusting in the way scores of songs that appeal to the pre and adolescent set so much are. A sample of the lyrics, akin to songs sung all over the country and in other parts of the English-speaking world:

Great green gobs of grimy, greasy gopher guts,
Marinated monkey meat,
All four quarts of all purpose porpoise pus,
And I forgot my spoon.
But they provided straws…

*-*

Inevitably, the night before the first day of school, Boo’s BF Kelly called to aske what Boo would be wearing for their first day of 7th grade. Boo was sitting at Bob’s computer in our study while she chatted with her friend, so I heard her say that she really wanted to, “Make a good first impression.”

Hearing her speak those words brought me instantly back to my own first day of seventh grade. Way back when in 1979, my twin and I and our friends began what we called High School; growing up in Montreal, we had nothing we called “Middle School.” Instead, we had elementary, which went to 6th grade, and high school, which began at 7th and went to 11th grade. There I was, in my light blue and multicolored checked shirt with a light blue-painted pin of an old-fashioned tricycle, climbing up the many steps up to the front door of the school. We were the smallest, the most clueless and the most frightened crew of kids, but one of the vice principals met us at the top of the steps with a clipboard and kindly directed us to the auditorium on our right, in order to get sorted into classes. At 65 pounds, I was a scrawny rack of bones, all sharp angles and knobby knees, but I was thrilled to have finally got to high school.

It’s not like that for Boo. For one thing, she is NOT the scarecrow I was - she’s a lovely 78 pounds; she has a fiercely loyal crew of friends and nearing the top of the heap in her middle school (where Monkey is in 5th), she loves school. I don’t think anyone escapes 7th grade psychically unscathed, but I have high hopes. She went off, head high, wearing a beautiful tie-back top of burgundy (the color she has already informed us her Bat Mitzvah dress will be) and crops.

-*-

“Ow!” “Crap! I just smashed my knee!!” Boo hopped on one leg, clearly in pain.

From me, “Why?”

Glare.

-*-

Finally, Boo sat at a nearly deserted (and almost desserted) dining table with Monkey, the table nearly cleared.

“What you need to know about Mr. Norburg the music teacher is that you can always distract him from doing boring songs by asking him questions.”

“Like what?” Asked Monkey

“Well, ask him about his beard, something like how long he’s had it. Watch out though.”

“Why?”

“Well, if you’re not lucky, he’ll go on and on about hair. I didn’t even know what electrolysis WAS until 5th grade music! Really, that man can tangent on ANYTHING.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, I don’t know, um, socks, Greek food, Ancient Egyptian brain removal, colonoscopies, dog breeding. We kept track - maybe he’ll come up new rants this year for you guys.”

Bob and I snorted from our vantage points in the kitchen.

The things we overhear…