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I have been a
dad long enough to develop quick responses to certain situations. You know the
kind: missed chores, homework crunches, lost socks, “I hate Brussels sprouts,”
and so on. Sometimes, though, even the best reflexes miss the mark.
The
conversation started out ordinarily enough. “Daddy?” my daughter asked. “Will
you buy me something?”
I have learned
to keep the “when I was your age” stuff to a minimum, finding it better to let
these things play out. Not that I mind the rolled eyes or glazed expressions,
but predictable answers give too much opportunity to prepare – better to keep
‘em guessing. And I’m still a tad quicker on my feet than they, an advantage
that’s fading daily. Still, you use what you have while you have it.
“What?” I
responded. Keep it short I say, don’t tip your hand.
“A promise
ring, Daddy.” Jewelry, I thought. Just what she needs. This should be easy;
just drag out a few specifics, then the big kibosh. Maybe indulge myself with
an when-I-was-your-age or two after all.
First, though,
the set-up. “What’s a promise ring?” I asked.
“ It symbolizes
a pledge to stay abstinent until marriage. I would like one as a symbol of my
promise.”
Tilt. The
right response was probably “Get in the car,” but I lost the moment fumbling for
words. I wasn’t surprised by her decision, but was taken by her boldness in the
face of possible peer reaction.
I doubt that
either of my children remember when they first heard where babies come from.
Our goal was always to establish a dialog on sex and other issues early, before
they had a chance to hone the sense of embarrassment and self-consciousness that
comes with adolescence. As they’ve approached and entered their teens, the
talks have moved beyond plumbing into the very real pressures and decisions that
kids seem to face earlier and earlier.
You hear more
about sexual abstinence as a choice for teens lately, with less of the
poo-pooing of the 1970s, 80s, and earlier this decade. Then the common wisdom
was that experimentation, if not outright promiscuity, was inevitable. “Save
your breath,” abstinence proponents were told, as public schools in some areas
began the distribution of condoms.
But barrier
methods don’t protect against everything, and I’m not merely referring to their
failure rates. There has been a great deal of social change in the last few
decades, much of it for the worse. Rates of teen pregnancy, drug use, and youth
violence that would have been shocking not that long ago now seem accepted, if
not yet acceptable. Now, though, we’re starting to see twinges of change, such
as the small abstinence movement gaining steam in some teen circles.
What is hard to
prove, empirically at least, is why. People on both sides bandy theories and
polls about, but the reasons behind human behavior can be a tad complex to
neatly fit a pollster’s query, and the right questions aren’t always asked. On
this one I have to go with my gut.
The notion that truth is relative, that there is no right or wrong beyond what
one personally believes, has become the order of the day. As “If it feels good,
do it” has given way to “Been there, done that,” many have become jaded. I
think the kids are beginning to look around and see the folly of it, pulling
some toward once-derided traditional values.
There’s an old adage that the way to boil a frog is to put him in cold water and
heat it slowly; if you throw him straight into a simmer he’ll hop out. Perhaps
we who started at room temperature can’t feel the burn as well as those thrust
into it.
In any event I
wouldn’t count the kids out yet. Each generation thinks the next can hardly
wait to toss the world into the proverbial hand basket, but sooner or later they
will inherit the place as we all do. Perhaps some are just savvy enough to be
thinking about what it is they’re getting into.
© 1997 – 2002 Brent Morrison
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