Middle School Sprint

When we got in the car, I gave Bea my phone to play with and turned up the radio.  Then I waited.  I knew something was wrong by the stiffness of Merry's smile and the terseness of her replies.  Did she have a good day?  Yeah, great.  Did she enjoy watching her friends at the track meet we'd just been at?  Yeah, it was great.

Then, as we turned up the highway, chinks in the brittleness.  She started sharing her troubles, and I was ready.  Ready to comfort and encourage.  I cheerily dished out my great wisdom: It will get better.  College is where the real men are.  Being friends is the best.  Just keep being you.  You're wonderful.

She looked at me.  "That's not really helping.  I'm in eighth grade now, and this is how I feel."

Wow.

When Martin was in high school, his track coach was a good ole boy with a potbelly and loud, booming voice.  He used to holler across the blazing hot Texas track:  "Cockroft!  Your white butt's sticking out like a dirtdobber!  Pick it up!"  Walking alongside the track, he'd drawl, "You think this is a Sunday jawg, son?"  Martin's favorite memory from track is when Coach would pound on the vending machine, retrieve his oatmeal pie, and send the boys out for long-distance training.  They'd have enough time to run down to the store, shoot the breeze, and continue jogging by the time Coach drove up slowly in his red car.  Those were the days, my friends, when track instructors coached from the windows of their cars.

And right then, speeding down the interstate at 65 while dispensing wisdom to my daughter, I felt just as lame as that coach.  Merry was basically telling me to get out of my car and hit the track with her.  Run a mile in my shoes, Mom.  

The thing is, I've run a lot of miles in those same shoes.  And I remember the agony.  "You're right," I said.  "You're in eighth grade, and it just stinks right now.  I remember how that feels, honey.  Totally, totally awful."

At Target, Merry and I suddenly remembered that she really needs clothes.  When we'd piled a bunch into the cart, I was ready to send her to the dressing room and multitask with Bea so we could get home at a good time.  Instead Merry said, "Come with me.  Please?"  Get off the side of the track, stop being my coach, and hang out for a while.  So we did.  At one point, the three of us jammed into one tiny dressing room, elbowing each other in the eyeballs.  But it was good.  She won't always want me to squeeze into small spaces with her and I don't want to miss a single graceful moment.

So it was that at 8:00, we sat under the pasty Target lights eating personal pizzas and sharing a giant cup of soda.  I said, "How about that retail therapy, Merry?  You feel better now?"

She wiped her hands with a napkin and smiled.  "Well, it didn't make my troubles go away, but it was a nice distraction, and that's probably what retail therapy is, right?"

Wise child.  When we got home, the three of us sat in the driveway, turned up Weezer, and head-banged.  When we stopped, Merry still had homework and I still had laundry and Bea had to go to bed, and all our troubles were still with us.  But it was so good.  

I think parenting a teenager is a great thing.  It reminds me to be here, right now, to acknowledge simply that my girl sometimes just feels the way she feels.  Sometimes she needs a coach but sometimes she just needs me to sweat it out next to her, gasping as we pant around that last corner, pushing ourselves down that last 100.  We can make it.  We'll run it together.