The quiet envy of pubescent teenagers
The idea that something could happen to your offspring is horrible for any mother. But some things have to happen to children. Pain comes to those who love. And puberty happens to those who live.
It's inevitable that babies who just smell sweet and yeasty will suddenly get greasy hair and pimples. And when you can no longer understand a word of what the two teenagers are saying to each other at the lunch table and have to have the punch line of their jokes explained to you, as your own mother once did, then it's time: puberty has arrived. And with it the biggest worry of all: What will it do to my child? And what will my child do with it?
Being a teenager means navigating a stormy sea in a nutshell.
I have reason to worry. The memory of my own teenage years is bleak, I was one big trouble spot. I hated school, the teachers, felt misunderstood and unloved and thought a lot about death. Fortunately, my sixteen-year-old seems to be coping better with this turbulent time than I did back then. Although she also thinks school is the worst thing ever, she copes brilliantly. And even manages what I would never have thought possible: that I envy her a little for this phase.
«You know that thing,» she asked the other night at dinner, «when a song suddenly takes you back to the past and you get a tug in your chest because that phase is irretrievably over?» Yes, I wanted to say, I've been there, it works with scents and books too! But before I could ask myself when that last happened to me, my daughter continued: «And then you realise that this irretrievable past was only two months ago.»
The greatest adventure
Is there a better way to summarise the feelings of a teenager? And at the same time the difference to being an adult? Being a teenager means navigating a stormy sea in a nutshell, hurtling uncontrollably from wave crests into abysses. Not knowing who you are and where you are heading can be exhausting, sometimes it is simply too much. But there is no greater adventure than finding yourself.
When was the last time I completely turned my life upside down and reinvented myself?
Puberty doesn't last forever and then the stormy seas calm down, life flows into a slow-moving river, and once children arrive, the direction is clear, with only your own ship making waves. I never had any objections to this, but in the face of my daughter's emotional sighs, I suddenly asked myself: haven't I lost something too? When was the last time I felt such passion and intensity? When was the last time I completely turned my life upside down and reinvented myself? Will I ever experience that again?
Perhaps that's the crux of the matter: that people don't usually do this voluntarily, that it has to happen to them. Like when you start a family and have no idea what that means. In any case, my daughter gives me the courage to embark on future adventures.
