It is not outside the realm of possibility that other homes with children can exist without as many rules as mine. But, unfortunately, it is also not outside the realm of possibility that my home would devolve into a scene from Lord of the Flies if it were not governed with rules. Left to their own devices, boys would pull dirty socks from the laundry and wear them every day, never take a bath, and likely accidentally die by daring.
We have rules for everything—rules I never thought I’d have to make. But that’s a subject for another day.
What I want to talk about today is how running a house with rules does one particular thing better than all the other things: It highlights the amazing strong will of the family’s non-conformer.
I have a few of these non-conformers in my house, and you’ll see them out and about with shirts that are not buttoned up correctly (Me, to my four-year-old twins: What is taking you so long to get dressed this morning? Both of them, in unison: We’re wearing button shirts and we’re buttoning them ourselves. Hey, more power to them.), shoes that likely don’t match, and, secretly (or not so secretly, if you’re the four-year-olds), no underwear.
There is one who is more…let’s call him intense…than the rest.
It’s not easy raising a non-conformer. Sometimes it’s the most annoying thing in the world.
I’ve never been the sort of parent who expects my kids to be perfectly behaved all the time. I also have never expected my kids to be exactly the same. I know kids well enough to understand that (a) they have bad days and (b) they’re all different. Maybe that makes parenting a little more challenging for me, but it also makes it more enjoyable. I get to see my kids blossom into who they are.
I have another problem as well: I’m a non-conformer. I’m the kind of person who, when someone tells me I can’t do something (I’m not speaking of crimes and such; don’t misunderstand me), my response is, “Watch me.” I want my kids to have that same attitude—not convinced by the “experts” who say they know everything about everything.
It’s just that when it comes to a nine-year-old non-conformer, things get a little tricky. Sometimes, honestly, I’d rather he just give it up and conform already. It would be easier for me.
My non-conformer walks to the beat of his own drum. He has a billion ideas in his head and a maddening urge to do them all, right now. He talks nonstop about the plans he has, the benefits of letting kids build with LEGO pieces all day every day, and Minecraft.
The most frequent word ejected from his mouth is “Why?” As a question. Sometimes as a response. All the times as a challenge to authority.
Here are some of the things we go round and round about.
Dress code
We don’t ask much. At school, we just want our sons to be comfortable—which means no shorts in the dead of winter and no sweat suits in the dead of summer, which is pretty much every month but January and February here in South Texas. Other than that we only expect tennis shoes, socks with the tennis shoes (you’d be surprised how many times they forget socks, which is why my house smells like an ancient Frito factory mixed with soured sweat when I’m not proactively diffusing essential oils), and a shirt of any kind. (We’ve had to add a couple of amendments to this, including (1) no shirts with nipple holes you cut out with scissors and (2) underwear. Please, underwear.)
The non-conformer slides around this dress code by not tying his tennis shoes. I told him the other day that he should just take the laces out and save himself some trouble. He said, “Why?” which is the standard response any time we say anything that has the word “should” in it. I’m waiting for him to trip and bust his face (not too badly, of course), so I can say, “That’s why.” In a very empathetic and understanding tone, of course.
Church is a bit of a different story. We still don’t expect much—we want them to wear jeans and a T-shirt or a nice shirt, if they so desire (they hardly ever desire). No holes in jeans, no sweat pants, no ratty clothes that make you look like a feral cat that got in a nasty fight.
The non-conformer is the kid who’s dressed in sharp black dress pants and shoes that are actually tied for once and yet dons a collared workout shirt.
It’s about all we can ask.
Homework
We want them to do it. Before tech time, before play time (as much as that pains me), before dinner time.
The non-conformer will fight, cry, argue, stomp for half an hour, then begrudgingly take five minutes to do his homework, because he’s a whiz at all things academic. Yesterday I tried to point out that if he just sat down as soon as he got home and did it, he would have so much more time for other things.
He said, “Why?”
I shook my head.
Dinner
Everyone in our house is expected to be at the dinner table promptly after we call them. The key word is “promptly.”
We will call everyone into the house, and most of my boys will be ravenously eyeing the food they just said they didn’t like before they’ve tasted it, and there is one seat empty. Guess whose.
We’ll go ahead and pray without him and dig in. He’ll amble to the table five or ten minutes later and say, in a voice full of hurt, “You’re eating without me?”
“We called you to the table,” his daddy will say. “You didn’t come.”
“I was just finishing this one thing,” he’ll say.
“And we were finishing dinner,” I’ll say. I don’t really say that. I say nothing, because there is no arguing with the non-conformer.
Even though he gets to the table five or ten minutes after we do, he’ll still beat Husband and me to the clean plate.
Bathing
The rule in our house is you must take at least four baths or showers a week.
That might seem gross to some people, but, hey, you’re not me and I’m not you. It’s a way we make parenting easier on ourselves.
The problem, however, is that when boys get old enough to take a bath or shower on their own, they no longer have the drive to do so.
My nine-year-old sort of decided he was ready for showers this year. The other day he came downstairs with some stringy, greasy hair hanging down in his eyes.
“Uh, how long has it been since you had a shower?” I said, trying to count back the days. I couldn’t remember.
He shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said.
“Go take one right now,” I said.
It’s not that he doesn’t want to take a shower; it’s just that there are more important things to think about and do. When I went upstairs later that same morning, he had not gotten in the shower. He was, instead, hovering around an old CD player listening to Jim Dale read him Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. When he lifted up his arms to reach for something on his desk, I nearly passed out.
And this is why we can’t have a nice-smelling house.
Bedtime
Bedtime is a challenge for any kid. The days are so much fun, and they are never done playing. For the non-conformer, bedtime is merely a suggestion.
It doesn’t matter how many times I lecture my non-conformer about how important the proper amount of rest is, he will look at me and say, “I just want to finish this book.”
And how can a mom who is an author say no to that? It’s what I hope every kid who reads my novels will say to their own parents—because it means they’re interested in the story and that they are learning to love reading.
But still. Sleep.
Sometimes he’ll come up with other things. “I’m going to clean my room real quick,” which means, in nine-year-old terms, he’s going to spread everything out that’s currently on his floor (and there are a lot of things), stack it into piles and then leave it there so it can spread out evenly across the carpet again. Ever been stabbed in the cheek by the tail of a LEGO dragon because you tripped over a scarf your son had lying in the doorway of his room? I have.
Sometimes I let him stay up and clean.
Other times I’ll find him sitting on the toilet, a book open in front of him.
“It’s time to go to bed,” I’ll say.
“I know,” he’ll say. “I’m just using the bathroom.”
For half an hour.
Going out as a family
When we’re having what we call a Family Fun Day, we tell our boys they can bring a few things with them—just not all the things.
My non-conformer, however, will walk around with a backpack that is perpetually dragging him down into a sitting position. One day we were all gathered around looking at the display of dinosaur bones at the local Witte Museum, and he had his knees bent like he was using a prehistoric toilet or something.
“Straighten up,” I said. “You’re standing weird. People are gonna think you’re…”
“My backpack’s a little heavy,” he said, after which he swung it from his back and opened it up. I was surprised (but shouldn’t have been) to see at least ten books, a billion LEGO mini figures, and a package of brand new art pencils that were losing their points every time he readjusted. The inside of his backpack was a colorful display of accidental pencil marks.
“What could you possibly need all of that for?” I said.
He shrugged. “In case I get bored.”
This has been the case since he was a little boy. We’d take him to the park down the street, walking the entire way (it’s only half a mile), and he’d shove coloring books and art pads and novels into his backpack, thinking he’d sit and draw or maybe read instead of playing on the playground equipment.
He never did. He would only complain about how heavy the backpack was on the way back. I would let him carry it anyway. Natural consequences.
He never learned, though. He still carries a backpack everywhere—like to the museum today.
Later that day of the museum outing, Husband found me sitting on a bench inside the children’s area, where the kids were playing dodgeball, climbing ropes (don’t worry, they were made to be climbed), and pumping their legs on exercise bikes.
“What are you doing?” Husband said.
“My backpack was a little heavy,” I said. “Thought I’d sit down and let my back rest for a while.”
Husband tried to pick up my backpack and was nearly thrown off the bench. “What do you have in there?” he said.
I shrugged. “A few things.”
He opened it up, rifling through at least three books, some National Geographic magazines, and a couple of writer’s notebooks. His eyes were wide when he turned back to me. “What could you possibly need all of this for?” he said.
I shrugged. “You never know when you’ll have a minute to yourself,” I said. “I come prepared.”
He shook his head and eyed the nine-year-old. Then he looked back at me. He seemed to be saying something with his eyes.
I have no idea what it was, but before I could ask him, my non-conformer plopped down on the bench next to me, unzipped his backpack and took out his notebook.
“Told you I would need it,” he said, before burying his face in the blank page and writing.
You could hear Husband’s laugh in the next town.
This is an excerpt from Hills I’ll Probably Lie Down On, the fourth book in the Crash Test Parents series. To get access to some all-new, never-before-published humor essays in two hilarious Crash Test Parents guides, visit the Crash Test Parents Reader Library page.
(Photo by Helen Montoya Henrichs.)
