teen age

Allie and I now have a teenager living in our house. His name is Sean and he'll be here through the end of the month.

Sean showed up last night. Almost as soon as he arrived he said he wanted to go for a walk to get a feel for the place and to clear his mind. Not a big deal, I suppose, except it was getting kinda late, and Alllie and I sort of live in the 'hood, so we were like, Ok, just be back before dark.

And so it gets dark and he ain't back.

I sent him with my cell phone, just in case something like this might happen.

I call him up.

"It's dark," I say.

He laughs. He tells me he's at the house of "a lady friend."

So I'm thinking, Ok, we got the whole trust-issue thing going full blast on the first night. Which translates me into telling Sean that we'll have a chat next Sunday night about whether or not he's earned the right to go over to this girl's house. Meantime, she can come hang out over here.

"On our porch," I say. "Or we can all watch a movie together."

Which Sean interprets to mean, You are now imprisoned by unreasonable, white freaks.

Sean starts whining and wiggling. All day. And by and by we agree that we might let him chill at this chick's house -- maybe even tonight -- if we can talk to her parental figure first.

For reasons Allie and I can never quite understand, this is unacceptable to him.

But he keeps working it. He demands to know why. "Because I don't want you knocking anybody up on my watch," I say.

We appeal to his debate coach, who backs me and Allie up. We even put in a call to Ebony, for a young, black opinion, but he doesn't answer.

Not that it would matter. My mind's made up. Allie's got my back. Case closed.

The ball's in his court.

(And, yes, I can hear my mom, and grandma and aunts and uncles all howling with laughter at this former rebel turned hand-wringing, draconian overlord.)