Bob Dreizler's Resources: An Ode to Teenage Daughters
An Ode to Teenage Daughters
The day my daughter Sonya was born I was ecstatic, but within two days I began to worry. I realized I would eventually be the father of--a teenage girl.
Teenage girls are strange, enchanting creatures who become intermittent fixtures throughout the lives of many males. My initial contact was with my baby-sitter. Five decades later, I was the father of a teenage daughter.
As a child, I must have wondered why my parents would leave me alone with someone who thought that talking on the telephone was more important than playing Chutes and Ladders with me.
My thoughts about teenage girls evolved quickly once I became a teenager. That annoying, geeky twelve year-old girl who sat next to me in sixth grade had blossomed into an awesome babe just four years later. Sitting near her affected my digestive system the same way eating peanut butter-and-mayonnaise-and-relish sandwiches did.
I was at the utter mercy of teenage girls. The dictatorial control they held over me as a baby-sitter was replaced by a subtle, more compelling form of control. I didn't need their supervision anymore; I needed something else. I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was, but it wasn't for lack of trying.
Teenage boys pretend to be tough guys, but calling a new girl to ask for a date takes more courage than pointing out an etiquette code violation to the high school's resident psychopath. It often took me a dozen attempts to dial a new girl's phone number. I'd dial six numbers, hang up, rephrase what I had to say, and then dial again. I wonder if it is any easier today with push-button phones.
After I married and became a parent, teenage girls became a necessity again. If my wife (a former teenage girl) and I wanted to leave our baby daughter at home and go to a nice restaurant, guess what? First, we had to find a teenage girl to baby-sit. Actually, we had to find several; it is always helpful to have one warming up in the bullpen. To new mothers and fathers, competent and alert neighborhood girls are more highly coveted than seats near the bathroom on a cross-country airline flight.
Once Sonya could take care of herself and her younger brother, she became a hot item on the baby-sitter circuit. Soon after, we entered into a bidding war with desperate neighborhood parents. At that point I knew that she had become a teenager.
My daughter was then and is now a smart, charming, attractive and often thoughtful girl/woman. However, before she learned the value of tact, she would frequently point out my flaws--usually in a loud voice. Up to that point I hadn't realized how tyrannical, selfish, stupid, hypocritical, arbitrary, and cheap I was.
As my daughter sharpened her verbal barbs, my skin grew as thick as an armadillo's. I knew she really didn't mean the worst things she said; it was only the hormones talking, but I wished the hormones would occasionally get laryngitis.
When she started dating, my parental anxiety escalated, partly because I recalled being a teenage boy. Images of those years remain, despite my brain's valiant attempts to suppress certain uncomfortable memories.
Even I had an occasional impure thought back then, but my notions paled next to sentiments rudely voiced by the worldly guys in metal shop. My daughter probably socialized with such boys, the kind that can dial a girl's phone number on the first try.
After Sonya moved away we regained access to our home telephone, but I soon missed her energy and optimism. Since then, she attended UCLA, studied in Chile, moved to San Francisco and started her career.
Despite our occasional difficulties, the lasting memories of her teenage years are the happy ones when she made her father proud. Flashes of those moments stream back into my mind whenever I'm sitting in a mall or a coffee shop and I hear one of the world's most charming sounds --the laughter of teenage girls.
Bob's adult daughter approved of and edited this story.