In a mere 12 days, I will be the father of a teenager. Yikes – especially when I feel like I’m still a teenager. Emotionally, that is. Whatever.
But it’s true, Bel turns 13 on the 14th. And, being the fine country kid that she is, she’s requested an overnight camping trip with three friends and her parents to celebrate the occasion. Cool. That’s the easy part – Walden Pond, here we come.
The hard part is that she’s counting on the completion and presentation of my “Book of Bel,” a project I started years ago that is basically a leather-bound journal of memories. She caught me writing in it years ago and demanded to know what it was since it was obviously a much different journal book than the cheap black and white “Mead” books she accustomed to seeing me frantically scribble in daily.
I told her it was a journal about my memories with her. And so she grabbed it, just like any seven-year old would do.
“No, no, no,” I told her, “it’s not for you now.”
“When?” she asked.
“When you’re thirteen.”
Sure, thirteen was arbitrary but it felt both long enough away and a semi-appropriate age to read some of the entries. And so it was, we had an agreement.
The good news is the journal is mostly complete. I’ve only got a few more memories and stories to add to the collection and then it will be ready for the presentation to the newly minted teenager.
I didn’t know when I made the “thirteen deal” that it would be, indeed, a true age of demarcation for us. It is, after all, coming at the end of a year in which I homeschooled her and just before she makes the journey to the middle/high school known as U-32. In other words: Big Changes – for both of us.
She’s ready for it. Me? I’m not too sure.
And in case you doubt her readiness and astuteness, consider this early entry from my “Book of Bel (1.7.04)”:
“Daddy,” Isabel asked, “where’s the dictionary?”
“Right here,” I responded, handing her our edition of the American Heritage Dictionary.
She took it and went to her favorite reading chair with it. Sitting down, she began thumbing through it while saying out loud, “d, d, d, d.”
“What are you looking up?” I inquired.
“I’m looking up ‘dad,” she said. “Because I want to find out why you’re so annoying.”
A little while later, with the dictionary tucked back into its place, I asked Isabel what she learned about me in it.
“I learned,” she reported, “that you are annoying because you read too much and you don’t play with me enough.”
Wish me luck.
For a more up-to-date entry, here’s the note I copied into the “Book of Bel” that she gave me for Father’s Day, 2010:
I remember that today is Father’s Day.
I remember the time Mom and I were in the bedroom and saw you fall off Dolly the horse.
I remember how funny you looked and how we laughed.
I remember the time you drove the mower into the Walden Pond.
I remember the time you told Buddy [our dog] to get a sock and he got the one on your foot.
I remember the time you tied the sock to the door while Buddy was pulling it.
I remember the dumbstruck look on your face when the door hit your head.
I remember that you are 57 years old. [Editor’s note: I’m not, she’s always added eleven years to my age to annoy me – imagine that.]
I remember that today is Father’s Day.
Now is the really cheesy part where I say “Happy Father’s Day.”
I love you.
Great kid. Great adventure. The gift that keeps giving, for sure.
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