Boys

For some reason the word “free” and “homeowner” attached some kind of link to some lame advertising????  Any ideas how that happened?????  Psycho!

A few months ago, my Dad forwarded a newspaper article.  I just saw the first part of it, but today I found part 2.   It’s fascinating/terrifying stuff.  It also rings very true to me.   Along with this, but quite different from this, is something I’ve noticed over the last few months.  Having Nate be getting older has been a totally different experience watching the girls do so.   Nate is VERY different from Anna and Abby.  I have a sneaking suspicion that he might be a little more restless and impulsive than maybe the average boy, but all in all he’s a pretty typical boy.   He does things I remember my brothers doing and that Brennan remembers doing as well.  I’m not going to say that some of things don’t make me a little crazy.  He tends to be destructive and speaks before he thinks.   I get frustrated and baffled often.  I hope as he matures he’ll temper those impulses and learn better judgment.   He’s worth all that because he’s also so sweet and funny and thoughtful.

That first part in the series I linked to above really struck a chord with me.  But, I’m also noticing another thing.  Adults, especially male adults feel perfectly free to treat boys very differently than I assume they would girls.   I remember hearing stories from my brothers of a man in our neighborhood at church throwing a boy across the room, a man I always knew as a mild-mannered man.  Granted, sometimes boys have a particular talent of pushing a person to his limit, but still I just don’t think that man would have done that to a girl. 

Nate and a friend of his were walking up the hill near our house.  They stopped to observe a sprinkler and bent down to play with it.  They didn’t ruin or damage it, just played with it and enjoyed changing the direction of the water.  I can understand how much most people would not want two kids messing with their sprinklers.  This homeowner, (again, I’ve always known him as a sweet shy man) saw them, approached them, grabbed their shirts and knocked their heads together while yelling at them that they were ruining his sprinklers. 

Another guy got his son’s side of a tiff with Nate and came out and swore at Nate and told him to get out of his yard. 

Now all of that is not to make any of these people sound terrible.  I understand why in every case they reacted.  The last neighbor apologized and felt really bad and we don’t hold anything against any of them.  I understand that my sweet son does/says things without thinking sometimes.  My point is that in every one of these instances, I don’t think they would have reacted like that to a girl.  I’m not suggesting that we should treat boys and girls the same, I think that article I linked to shows we shouldn’t.  I am suggesting that for some reason, probably because that’s the way it’s been for a very long time, we feel free to be mean and reactive and sometimes violent with boys.  I have no problem with a neighbor telling Nate to get away from his sprinklers, but to grab his shirt, yell at him and knock his head into his friends’ is not okay with me.  

I want to raise kind, smart, sensitive young men.  I want my boys to know that they deserve to be treated with respect and kindness and fairness.  I’m not sure they’re getting that message.