gender learning

I have learned a lot about boys over the last 6 years, watching my own kids grow...I'd say UP, but to be more accurate, should probably just say...taller.

Honest to God, I could have gone my whole life not learning how the male gender processes and learns stuff.

I will most likely be writing a lot about my kids. They're the source of my silver strands of hair lately.

It's...painful.
Sometimes, literally painful.

I am convinced that I will never really understand male relationships with each other.

Let me give you a classic example...

My son has a friend named Eric. He would weigh about 114 lbs if you hosed him down. My son weighed 158 lbs when he started training for wrestling. He was mostly muscle then.

After a couple of months on the team, he's a solid 148 lb rock.

His idiot friend takes shots at him all the time. Every time I turn around, he's punching him in the arm or smacking him or throwing something at him. I do not get this, because girls DON'T DO THIS.

To my dismay, my son takes this. His reasoning is that, he knows if he hits him back, he can hurt him. That, and he somehow gets that this is just play. All I can think of is, "GOOD! If you hit him back one good time, I bet his ass doesn't hit you again!"

Every now and then, when I'm beside myself that my son isn't knocking the crap out of this boy - I am compelled to say, "You know Eric, one of these days, I'm going to let that boy hit you back..."

This would be the part when he screams and says things like, "Nooooooooooooooooooo! He'll kill me with those big guns!" - which apparently is the term all my son's friends use to describe my son's arms. Which, in all honesty, are massive.

You have to understand. My whole family is, what my brother coined, the "get the rope" types. If you cross one of us, we find it perfectly acceptable to string you up and take care of you old school style (i.e.: take you behind the shed and smack the living crap out of you).

I am ADAMANT about my kids never being used as a punching bag. I understand this is the 'tolerant' stage of society, but really - if someone hits my kid unprovoked and he hits said kid back - good. I don't care how non-PC that is. By the same token, if my kid starts something, I will kick his ass myself.

Don't be a bully.
Don't be a doormat.

Unpopular sentiment, I know.
I don't care.

This is the part I REALLY don't get.

Eric was over. I walked into the living room. I see Eric with my boxing gloves on. I KNOW that no good can come of this. I'm kind of frozen in the archway between the dining room and living room when both of them announced to me that they're just playing!

Two seconds later, and I could see it as if it were playing out in front of me in slow motion... my son takes two steps forward and Eric swings with his right and makes contact.

::POW::
RIGHT in the temple.

They could NOT have choreographed it better in the ring.

I watched my son stagger two more steps. I screamed, "ENOUGH" and Eric dropped the gloves to the ground instantly.

My son said, "What was that?"
and I said, "karma!".

I KNOW that was wrong, but I couldn't have stopped it from coming out of my mouth if my life depended on it. At least I didn't add the rest that I was thinking, which was, "...that's for some shit you did that I didn't catch yet"

I do have some minuscule amount of restraint, I guess.

The two morons start laughing now. This throws off my entire sense of justice. At long last I was thinking my son was finally going to take a shot at him. No. I flat out say, "why.....are you....not beating the hell out of him right now?!".

He, Eric and my former husband all looked at me like I was from another planet and they all simultaneously said that it was against the rules to hit him back because it was an accident.

I can't even deal.

I have a best friend of 24 years, Anita. We've lived in several places and states together. We went to high school together. We're each others kid's Godmothers. We vowed that no matter how many times we get married, the other is the Maid of Honor. She signed my marriage certificate twice as my witness. I've lived with her family even when she didn't live there. The list goes on. But I can tell you this, if one of us clocks the other IN THE TEMPLE, the other person is getting hit back on the spot!

NO QUESTION ABOUT IT.
AND the hitter, would EXPECT to get hit by the HITTEE.

Your ass just has to stand there and take it because you deserve to be hit.
Accident...or not!

Why you might ask...

BECAUSE WE KNOW THAT WHEN WE PICK UP A POTENTIAL WEAPON, THAT SOMEONE CAN GET HURT AND IT'S UP TO THE PERSON WHO PICKED UP SAID WEAPON TO ENSURE THAT NO ONE DOES!

This is NOT a difficult concept! It is, however, a concept totally lost on 15 year old boys. And, to my horror, all of my male friends so far. No matter what age they are.

I made the distinct mistake of turning to my father for guidance. I told him the story and there was dead silence on the phone for a good 20 seconds.

I was patiently waiting for golden words of wisdom.

A nugget of truth I could carry with me that would magically make sense of all that transpired.

I don't know what the fuck I was thinking...

What I got instead was...
"You know, I once pushed your Godfather's head through a glass storefront window downtown"

dull glazed over stare...
Then the pain started again and I had to get off the phone...