The Literal Mind of a Teenager

Monday, March 28/16

So originally my daughter had a soccer game scheduled for tonight at 7pm which meant dinner for my son and I would have to be something fast and easy given the time crunch between when I got home and we had to leave to watch the game.  Spaghetti is the fallback dinner of choice at times like this and that was what I was planning on making until I got a text from the daughter saying she was feeling exhausted from the weekend and probably not going to play tonight after all.

I sent my son a text letting him now the change of plans and asked him if he wanted to have something else for dinner besides spaghetti and soon got a response saying he wanted to have hamburger helper, not my favourite but I do like to make things that he enjoys now and again.

I sent him another one telling him to take the hamburger out of the freezer and out it in the sink so it could thaw out and he said no problem consider it done.

When I got home the first thing I noticed was the box of hamburger patties sitting on the counter so I asked my son to come to the kitchen while I hung up my jacket and put my work bag on one of the bar chairs. When he entered the kitchen I pointed at the box and asked what was it doing out and even as I asked the question I knew the answer he was going to tell me.....

"Dad, you asked me to take it out earlier when we were texting about dinner"

"Son, I asked you to take out the ground beef"

"No, you said hamburger, reread the text dad"

So I did just that......and lo and behold he was right in that I asked him to take out the hamburger.

When I asked him to take it out I'd been visualizing the ground beef in the freezer, which he has seen me use to make his favourite meal numerous times over the years.

In my mind he knew I meant ground beef when I used hamburger and in his mind he heard hamburger so he took it out.

When I asked him if he'd ever seen me use hamburgers to make hamburger helper he said he didn't think so but why call something hamburger helper if it didn't contain hamburgers??

I was thinking of a response to that one when it dawned on me that he is a typical teenager and in particular a typical male teenager in that his mind works almost solely in absolutes.

So based on that conclusion there was no way I could be upset with him as he'd done just what I asked and if it was wrong, well that was on me and not him.

Going forward I'm going to have to really think about what it is I'm asking him and phrase any requests in such a way as to remove any ambiguities.

As it turns out we ended up having the spaghetti after all but it was still a nice meal.

The more I've thought about this little exchange the more it makes me smile and kind of cherish it as one of those things that makes me appreciate the relationship I have with my son. He's a good kid and if this is the worse he does than we're going to be just fine.

Marcus