By ROD WALTON Staff Writer on Aug 9, 2012, at 12:40 PM Updated on 8/09 at 12:40 PM
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Here's what I'll call a teen-ager primer on how to get what you want. Lesson No. 1: Try to get your parents’ unanimous approval without them actually talking to each other.
Exhibit No. 1: One of my daughters lives in Tulsa during the summer, so I brought another daughter down from Bartlesville so they could hang out and we could go see a Drillers game together. Sometime shortly before we met outside ONEOK Field the younger daughter asks if she can stay with Big Sis a couple of days since Big Sis is going back to college soon and quality time is so important.
Actually, I was informed, by text message, the plan was already done. I’m pretty slow and it took about 30 minutes to remember a crucial follow-up question.
“You better have cleared that with mom,” I texted back. “Or trouble’s ahead.”
She promised she would and I followed up again when we all met for the Drillers game.
“What’d your mom say?” I asked. “She said she didn’t care and it was only you who might have a problem with it,” came the reply.
I hate being put on the spot as the “only one who might have a problem.” I wish someone would share my problems but that’s the Damocles Sword of being the Grand Pooh-Pah.
So the girls got their way, as they usually do. The morning after, Mom said she wasn’t so pleased about the overnight plans because they had things to do at home today.
“They told me you didn’t care,” I protested. “Well, they told me you didn’t care,” my wife answered.
Curses! The “Double They Don’t Care Switch!”
Our daughters were so wrong about this and yet so right. In all our daily confusion brought on by too many things to do, mom and dad all too frequently fall back on “Ask the Other Parent, please.”
I wondered if kingdoms rise and kingsdom fall on the confusion of “I’m busy, ask the King” or “Be a good Princess and go ask the Queen.”
Our so-called family subjects know how to exploit this all too well. Thank goodness it was only a baseball game this time around. A trip to Italy could be in the future if we’re not more careful about our parental communications.
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