The Boy pt 7? (Oh I dont know anymore...)

I hung out with a lot of guys when I was little. My first best friend was a boy who lived next door to me. I remember filling the back of his metal Tonka dump truck with cement with him as we played under the pine tree in his yard. I'm sure his mother was thrilled with us. After that, we moved to a neighborhood where my sister and I were really the only girls of our age. So, of course, we played games little boys would like to play: cops and robbers, space ship, etc. Somehow we always ended up the robbers, or the aliens, the bad guys.

When I was a teenager, all of my friends, with the exception of my sister, were guys. I'd watch them wrestle each other, try to jump off their parents' porch roofs, and have "manliness contests." My sister and I labeled them "manliness contests" because one guy would do some stupid stunt, and then the next guy had to one-up him, and then the next would one-up him as well. It could be anything from, who had more chest hair, to who could do more chin-ups, push-ups and sit-ups. Next thing we knew, they had a adopted the name for themselves. My now-husband was one of the gang. Before we were dating, when he had returned from the Army for a visit, one of the guys said, "Ooh, he's been through basic. Lets see what he can do now! Manliness Contest!" Then they all proceeded to see who could do more push-ups.

I never understood until I had my own son why my father would say, "We men are such bone heads."

All of Josh's young life thus far has been filled with impulsive actions. He never thinks. He does. At four, he found the matches and nearly torched the entire neighborhood. At five, he cut the cord to the phone line with scissors and then proceeded to wail, "Why do I do the things I do?". At six, he decided to pop-a-wheelie on his scooter while going down our very steep hill. He was covered for about two weeks with head to toe scrapes and scratches. I have found our basement foam ceiling tiles completely disintegrated. He has broken and destroyed many of my nice things and his toys. He has nearly taken his own life on many an occasion attempting to do dangerous stunts that, I suppose, he determined would be fun. Once, he and his friend convinced his best friend's little brother to stand on the swing. Then they pushed the swing and continued to keep it in motion by hitting the swing with wiffle ball bats. The little brother has me to thank for saving his life.

I looked back at the stupid things my guy friends would do, then look at my son, and notice his grand ideas aren't that much different from some of the things my friends did. Then I polled my female friends and ask them if they would have done any of the stunts I have been privy too, and they give me this shocked and horrified look like I'm some alien. That's when I decided my kid must be normal, and this must be a "boy thing."

We go through periods where he lacks more impulse control than other times. Currently, we are in one of those times. The latest phrase in the house is, "Is that a GOOD idea? Or a BAD idea." Usually this question alone will stop the activity that had been currently set in motion.

This morning I heard a funny noise as I combed my hair. I figured it was Josh who was supposed to be making lunch. It sounded like something was sawing through something else. I hollered down, "I don't know what you are doing, Son, but I want you to tell me...Is what you're doing a GOOD idea? or a BAD idea?" I still haven't found out what he was doing, but he immediately stopped. There are some things I don't want to know.

Then later I was doing my business in the bathroom. I heard a very loud knocking so I asked, "What do you want?"
"Oh I wasn't knocking," Josh replied.
"Then what were you doing?"
Sheepishly he answered, "Something that was a bad idea..."