how i went to sleep and woke up with a teenager..and other things that could happen to you,too

It all started last week when Z (now 14) asked me for some Axe body spray.

Huh?

Why would my little boy want to smell like a middle Eastern businessman?

Oh, wait. Girls. I think he likes them now. I think they like him. I think Axe is to 2012 what Drakaar was to my 1991.  I took a guy friend of mine with me to the Wal Mart and let him guide me to some Axe fragrance that he said smelled "not girly" and also didn't have some highly inappropriate name like Probe or Throb.

The Axe was just another in a series of the undeniable growing up process my oldest child is going through...that I'm trying my best to deny.

• No one mistakes him for me on the phone anymore.
• He takes a shower every day.
• Gone are the days when I could buy him $5 plain-colored t-shirts from the clearance rack and he'd be thrilled.
• He has an opinion on how his hair is cut. And styled. Yes...styled. With a certain brand of gel.
• His feet are now bigger than mine.
• He makes culturally relevant jokes.
• And my baby--who has woke up on his own since he was 6, at 6 am, with a smile on his face, and made his own bed...now occasionally has those days I have to approach him cautiously with a stick and poke him awake like a bear. Though he still makes his bed. And eventually smiles.

I guess one of the most bittersweet things was when he said (in his ever deepening/cracky voice), "I need a razor, Mom."

A razor?! As in to shave?! And sure enough--he did have enough dark-ish hair on his upper lip to justify removal. From the cupboard in my bathroom, I pulled out the spare electric shaver that Brad left behind. Not sure why I've never been able to get rid of it. Probably the same reason there is still a pair of his dress socks left in his otherwise empty dresser drawer. I handed Z the razor, showed him how to turn it on, and (to the best of my memory) how to move it around without getting razor burn...and sent him off to his bathroom.  ALONE.

 I never thought I'd be raising a son into his teenage years by myself. Not growing up with a father and having my older brother move across state when I was only 4, I have nooooo clue what I'm doing here. My only saving grace is that I'm pretty much a 36 year old woman with the personality of a teenaged boy--I love skateboarding, hockey, roller derby, luchador wrestling, loud music, pizza, dubstep, and belching--so I know I'm sometimes more of a playmate than the disciplinarian I should be. It's had its consequences.

Maybe because of the divorce, maybe because of the fact that I work so very much, maybe because of the whole home school to public school switch, or maybe just because everyone is getting older and we've been largely trapped inside all winter, but my boys are fighting more. Not terribly. But shifting from being one another's best friends to the "He's looking at me!/ He's touching me!/ You stink!/ You have a giant head!/Get your bum out of my face!" phase.

I could do without it.

I've been spending a long time each night on my knees in prayer asking for God to fill in where I can't.  To make up for the gaps that I didn't create, or can't  help but create. And hoping it works.

Z is and will continue to be my guinea pig kid--the one that the following three boys will probably have privileges and punishments decided by. He may be the only one who ever gets an i-anything. Or a car. Or to play in a rock band. He's also the barometer for how well I'm doing, doing this on my own. He's a brave, funny, sweet, kind, smart boy...who I trust is just traveling through the dark, crazy hormone-ridden tunnel of teenagerhood toward that man I pray I've done a good job molding. And I think I have. I hope I have.

Even if he does currently smell like citrus and patchouli oil and Cool Ranch Doritos :)