I remember the first time I was called in by my parents to have a long talk. Apparently I was becoming a man and some hormones were starting to do things to me.
I am very excited to tell you that its not the talk you think. You know “the talk,” the one where as a man, dad calls him in to tell him about the stuff that his body is going through and other yucky stuff that as a parent he is supposed to tell him, but as a child he does not want to hear or listen to. It was not that talk.
So I was told that my parents (both of them) wanted to have a word with me. Scary!!! I know right. Ok so before I go into the room and summarize what was said, let me give you a little history.
I went to a boarding school for the first 3 years of my secondary school life. That is like going to high school for the first three years. then moving to a different school to complete your education.
I was at this boarding school and because I had had bad experiences with female folks in there and even some out of school experiences, I decided that I did not like girls. I could tolerate the women but not the girls. I will give more details in the next part of the series.
I remember a particular girl at my school, one I absolutely hated. No folks! Hate is not a strong word; not in this case. I hated her so much I could not stand to be in the same place with her; I think it was later I realized that it was not hate but a crush. Oh well…moving on. She found a way to bring me back from “hating” her and all girls to actually liking her and tolerating other girls.
For the sake of this story lets call her Bianca. Bianca and I got so close we were inseparable. We were so close everyone around us assumed we were dating.
We were in a Christian boarding school and relationships like that were prohibited. So our parents were alerted to our misconduct. The part that pissed me off was how much my parents believed the school over me. I was close to this girl and maybe there were feelings but we were not a couple.
I entered the room and my parents told me that I had to end the relationship. After trying in futility to convince them that we were just friends and there was nothing intimate in our relationship, I agreed to end “the relationship.” Truth be told there was nothing to end. We were on holidays when I realized two things. 1. She lived just one street away from my house and 2. She still wanted to be friends. To be honest, I wanted to stay friends, so we stayed friends but it was secret. Until it got out a few years later.
My parents do not know this and they probably will find out from reading this but I would go on to date this girl for 9 years after that incident. Yes 9 years…its not a typo
After that day I made up my mind that when I have kids, I would listen to them and do everything I can to see things from their point of view. Its really easy to judge parents for what they did or did not do. What is hard is admitting to yourself that you can use the experience you went through with your parents to shape your relationship with your children.
I was born in the 90s and this is my resolve “I HAVE TO DO BETTER WITH MY KIDS THAN MY PARENTS DID WITH ME.”
KUDOS to you Mom and Dad. You will always be my heroes. I love you.
By the way in the next part we check out my love life and the girls I actually dated. I hope you guys enjoy it.
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See you in Part 5
