The Coolest Mom EVER!

Okay… I just might be the COOLEST MOM EVER!  For danged-sure…I’m the COLDEST!

I just wanna say (before beginning)… that 17 year-old boys are IDIOTS.

That’s all. Just wanted to put that out there.  J

So…my work day was winding down.  The phone rang.  My friend and co-worker handed it off to me.

The first words I heard?

“Hi, Mum.  I did a really stupid thing…”

If you’re a mother, you’ll understand the gut-clenching reaction I felt upon hearing those words.  On one level, I understood that Eli had called me and was talking to me…so he must be ALL RIGHT.

But on the other hand…all I could feel was ‘doom and gloom’. Had he been hurt?  In an accident? Arrested? WHAT???

Eli proceeded to tell me that he’d gotten ‘stuck’.

STUCK?  Stuck where?  Stuck how?  I’d given him permission to drive to school so that he could ‘stay after’ to finish a project that is due…tomorrow. But driving to and from North Anson didn’t involve any ‘getting stuck’ scenarios.

But see…he’s a boy.  I don’t profess to understand the hold that testosterone has on an adolescent male…but I know it DOES.  I’ve been the mother of ‘boys’ for almost 31 years and I’ve come to realize…they are idiots.

He’d taken his Explorer ‘off road’.  Just to see what it could do.  Understand…his rig isn’t an ‘off road’ vehicle.  But try telling that to a boy who has four-wheel-drive.

Oy!  I could go on and on (and on!) here…but I won’t. Suffice it to say…this wonderful (formerly believed-to-be responsible and common-sensical) young man got his rig stuck WAY off the ‘maintained’ road. Up on the side of a mountain. Beyond the plowed road. Beyond where Explorers are made to go. Without telling anyone where he was going.  Without wearing a jacket or boots.  On a day that didn’t see 10F in the full light of sun. Judas H. Priest! If things had worked out differently, my son could have died. So yeah… I was just a tad wound up.

I arrived home 15 minutes before sunset. I won’t be specific about the heart-to-heart conversation I had with my youngest offspring, except to say…a heart-to-heart was had.

But when all was said and done…Eli wanted to ‘go get’ his vehicle.

I was inclined to let it rot there until Spring. Inclined to let snowmobilers vandalize it, the winter weather assault it...I mean, didn’t he deserve to lose his vehicle, after behaving so irresponsibly?

But once I arrived home… once I’d seen for myself that Eli was okay…I softened up.  I couldn’t help it.  All I could think was… “Hey! I was a kid once, too….and didn’t I make mistakes?  Didn’t I screw up?”

The short answer is…YES.

In the end, I did what mothers like me do. I ‘came to the rescue’.  Oh, that’s not to say I didn’t want to hand off responsibility to his father…another male who should witness the idiocy that the ‘fruit of his looms’ was capable of.

But even while considering the idea of shucking ‘duty’ until Steven could get home and deal with it, I was feeling that strange sense of guilt and responsibility.  Steven works far harder than I do (or our son does.) To expect him to arrive home to (and deal with) a family crisis was unreasonable. Not at night.  Not in the total darkness.  Not when the temps were hovering at ZERO Fahrenheit.

SO! I shucked my ‘work’ clothes.  Donned boots, face mask, insulated jacket, gloves and possible accessories. Fired up that Kubota bitch, Lena…and drove a mile up the road…and then up the steep snowmobile trail towards Spruce Pond…that ‘trail’ that Eli was sure his Explorer could conquer.

We arrived at the vehicle…Eli running up the trail behind me.  Yes, it made sense.  Good sense. The young man no doubt thought I’d offer to let him sit in the bucket or stand on the 3-point hitch and ‘hitch’ a ride…but that would have been DANGEROUS.  So… a little fresh air and exercise were in order!  Heh…

We attached a chain to his rig and to the tractor’s bucket. He got in, started the Ford, put it in reverse….and Lena and I yarded that sucker out of the hole it had been buried in.  After some jigs and jags, the Explorer was once again pointing downhill. 

And I was ‘frozen to the toes’n’!

He followed me down the trail.  Once we were back at the road, I had Eli drive home in his Explorer to wait for me.  Lena doesn’t go much more than 10-12 miles per hour with chains on (and 10 mph at ZERO Fahrenheit is some kinda COLD!) Once I and my frostbitten cheeks and numb fingers arrived at the house, I backed the tractor into the shed, shut her down and instructed Eli to drive me back up to the end of the road so that I could retrieve my truck.  (No, I hadn’t made the poor lad jog ALL the way…only from the end of the road to where he’d gotten his truck buried. I’m not completely heartless, after all.)

All in all, the day ended successfully.  The Explorer is parked in the yard.  My son (whom I love with all my heart) is safe.  Lena is none the worse for wear.  Steven didn’t have to venture into the cold western woods after a long day at work. My cheeks will recover, as will my pinky fingers.

And…I have racked up some serious creds. 

I asked Eli this: “How many boys do you know who have mothers who can and will drive a tractor in sub-zero temps up a mountainside after dark to pull her son’s rig from the snow? Am I not the coolest mother you know?  Or…if it kills you to say ‘yes’ to that…am I not the COLDEST mother you know?”

He had to admit… I am.

Of course, his ability to drive that ‘off-road Ford’ depends on maintaining a good standing with me, so what else could he say?

Sigh… BOYS.  They’re idiots… and I mean that in the nicest sense of the word.