We'll All Need Therapy Part 2

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 I had to set my coffee down for this next one because I was laughing so hard I almost baptized my keyboard.

Educational Materials I Was Not Emotionally Prepared For

They gave Sir WhatTheHeck a 'birds and the bees' crash course that none of us will ever recover from.

Sir WhatTheHeck (18, dramatic, exhausted): “They made me watch stick figures doing it.”

Me : “WHAT IN THE WHAT?” 

Sir WhatTheHeck: I was ten, not yesterday. 

That did not help!

Rob, calm as a man who has seen things: “Well… he was looking at inappropriate pictures online. So if he’s curious, we showed him how humans are formed until they’re born.”

Sir WhatTheHeck: “I’ll be scarred for life.”

Me: “Wait… they have stick figure cartoons doing THAT? Who makes that?!”

Rob: “It’s from Sweden. It’s educational. Not stick figures. A cartoon he could understand.”

Me: “Well now I’m scarred for life.”

Sir WhatTheHeck thought he was about to get in trouble. Instead, he got a scientific documentary he did NOT ask for. I thought he was looking at literal stick figures. Rob was trying to be responsible. Brandy was probably in the background like, “This is gonna be a good one for the books.”  Me? I’m just trying to understand why Sweden is out here making educational cartoons that traumatize American teenagers.

The Bridge, The Bicycles, and the Linguistic Disaster

The chaos wasn't over. Cap'n Chaos walked in from school and immediately raised everyone's blood pressure..."

After the concert last night, Cap'n Chaos walked home half a mile in the dark. Half a mile of anything could happen. It was late when he got home, The lectures began as soon as he got home from school the next day.

 “You don’t walk alone at night. you CALL us. People have been killed on that trail. You are not invincible.” 

Cap'n Chaos, unfazed, shrugs: “I’m not afraid of that homeless guy under the bridge. Why does he need fourteen bicycles?”

Me: “He’s probably stealing them.”

Rob: “Oh, he is.”

Cap'n Chaos: “This homeless person (he was being politically correct until he said:  oh — 

I just call them Ho-mos for short.”

Me: “NO. You cannot do that. That word means something else.”

Cap'n Chaos ignores me like I’m background music  “Yeah, this ho-mo is really good at it. He’s so good he could give tips to other people who want to be homeless.”

Me: “WAIT. WHAT? Who wants to be homeless?”

Cap'n Chaos wasn’t trying to insult anyone — he was literally abbreviating the word “homeless” like he was writing a grocery list.  I tried to save him from accidentally inventing a slur. He bulldozed right past me Then he casually suggested homelessness is a skill set people aspire to.

Cap'n Chaos, the Rose Tattoo, and the Descent Into Madness

The moment the conversation went from “normal family talk” to “we need a chaperone.”

Cap'n Chaos strolls in from school with a rose drawn on his arm like he’s auditioning for a biker gang made of  Freshmen.

Me: “Who is writing on your arm?”

Cap'n Chaos, casual as a cat in a sunbeam: “Chelsea.”

Rob: “Does she have a boyfriend?”

Cap'n Chaos: “No, she’s almost special needs, and the school doesn’t let you date the special needs kids.”

Rob: “How do you know this?”

Cap'n Chaos: “I just know.”

Me: “Is it written in the handbook? ‘No dating special needs kids’?”

Rob: “DO NOT go ask. I do NOT want to be called into the principal’s office because you want to date someone with special needs.”

And that’s when the conversation fell off a cliff.

Cap'n Chaos: “Mom hits me like I’m adopted.”

Me: “You still haven’t told him?”

Brandy: “MOM. NO. Shhhhh.”

We’re tag teaming on poor little Cap'n Chaos. Now he thinks he might be adopted.

Yeah, Cap'n Chaos will definitely need therapy one day.

  Every single person in that room was having a different crisis: Cap'n Chaos was just vibing, saying whatever popped into his head. Sir WhatTheHeck was leaning against the wall, looking like he was mentally calculating how many years of therapy it would take to forget the Swedish cartoons. Rob was trying to prevent a school-wide scandal. I was trying not to choke on my laughter. This wasn’t a conversation. This was a family avalanche."



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