Short Fiction--The Guy Next Door: Part 4

"Man! You're hard!" exclaimed GND this morning after explaining to me that his adult son has lost the keys to the family camp up in the West Virginia hills. 

"Hard? I wouldn't say that, but I'm not soft. Couldn't be, being a single parent. Besides, it's been my observation that many parents go easy on their boys, no matter how old they are."

"What?! How can you say that?" 

"Rather easily," says I, calmly. 

"When I was growing up, my sister and I could cook, clean, organize and manage household tasks by the time we were twelve. We had multiple chores, indoors and out. My brother, though he helped with the seasonal raking and shoveling, was solely responsible for taking out the trash. Not much else. He mustn't have been a novelty because guy after guy would scold me, 'Why are you doing that?' when I'd be hauling out the trash. 'That's MY job.' JOB--as in singular."

"Well, I wasn't raised like that. I had to dig potatoes--" 

"I know all about the endless rows of potatoes that ate up your summer vacation time," I cut him off. "Case in point," I say with one hand raised, as if visibly grasping the crux of my argument, "who constructed the garden bed your son recently asked your help with? Did he help at all? No, he didn't. You did it all by your lonesome."

"But, he had to work!"

Not having any interest in arguing with him, I shrug and say, "You can sling me all the excuses in the world, but you didn't do as he had asked. You didn't HELP him build a garden bed. You did it for him. And now you are mailing him a new set of keys rather than holding him to the responsibility that you had entrusted him with when you first granted him use of the cabin. He's a grown man, so yes, I am not sold that your method is ENabling him to be the man you expect him to be. If you ask me, bring back potatoes! But, heck--he's your kid; it's your call." 

We laugh and the topic changes. But, I'm thoughtful of how hard he truly perceives me to be. Of how he now probably thinks I think him soft, which I don't entirely. I know he's looking for approval and I can see it in his eyes as we politely move the conversation onto safer ground that it bothers him that I don't always readily give it. The reality is that it's not in my nature to placate. And, on the topic of parenting or marriage, he's had fair warning. 

I've raised kids alone, with no support from a non involved, absent-in-more-ways-than-one ex. I've dated non custodial divorced men. I've worked with men who seem to go to work only to complain about their supposedly miserable, sexless marriages or witch ex wives to their female coworkers. I've heard it all, and excuses don't cut the mustard with me. Yet, we, most of us, have our pockets full of 'em. It's the way we seem to get on in the world, with false hoods and bullshit. 

"How are you today," the clerk asks. And we hypnotically respond that we are just fine regardless of whether that's, in fact, true. We think they are just being polite by asking and doubt they are sincerely concerned for our well being. 

Somewhere down the line, I just gave up the game. I understand that my having done so throws him off his. But, then, I've been told before that I don't play by the rules. 

Not that I was ever given a manual.