MY 13 YEAR OLD SON TIES ONE ON

           YOU CAN TEACH AN OLD DOG NEW TRICKS

I have no doubts about loving my thirteen year old son. I have had some doubts as to whether or not he loves me as I am a continual embarassment. First off I am an older father - 71 years old. This is about 20 years more than the age of most of his friend's fathers. Additionally I don't seem to contain myself in social ocassions particularly around his friends.

    

I seem to forget that he hates it when I appear at the front door when his friends come to play. I also forget not to make what I think is some snappy comment to his friends such as hello. And when he is pitching on his little league team he is ultra sensitive to how loud or soft I sound, and how my mannerisms are and the like.

It would appear I am a total loser as both a person, and as a father. This is particularly disconcerting because I am a psychoanalyst and am supposed to be on top of all of these matters. I certainly don't want to be the object of my son's ill will when he is potentially seeing his own analyst and holding me responsible for his potential overwhelming interpersonal and authority issues.

I have kept strict boundaries and have tried my best not to have him experience me as intrusive. So I have observed a relatively few words spoken between us over the past few months. I forgot to mention he hates hearing me chew so that he frequently takes his dinner up to his room where he can protect himself from the grating sounds of my teeth hitting the grizzle on chicken bones - a pleasure I absolutely refuse to change. I have my limits!

It was in this context that last night I thought that for mental health purposes it would be wise of me to be cool and say something relatively neutral that would be a compensating action for our missing lack of father son bonding. So into his room I went and said: Mike. The Yankees suck. I couldn't imagine having picked a more neutral topic - one which I knew he would suffer no ill feelings  as the Yankees have sucked - at least so far.

"Dad!", he exclaimed. Do you have to talk to me now?

Damn - I failed again.

I retreated from his room - not all together surprised but a bit chagrined, thinking that what I thought was cool was apparently experienced by him as uncool. I free associated back to such ocassions when I was 13 as my father made far less attempts to connect with me than I have tried to make with my son, but when he did I too felt prickly in his presence. I too cringed when I heard the sound of his voice and saw him looking directly at me, like the Hulk ready to pounce on me. But unlike my father who used to take my rebuffs personally, I at least recognize that my son appears to be perfectly on target for his age. Yet I must admit that his last aggravated response did make me feel somewhat saddened.

And then, just when I imagined that we would probabvly never talk again until his 21st birthday he came downstairs into the living room where I was eagerly awaiting the news of who won the primaries in Pennsylvania and asked me for help.

What do you need Mike?  He put a tie in my hand and asked me to show him how to tie a Windsor knot. Amazed at the implications of his reaching out to me - a losers loser - I proceded to spend the next half hour instructing, tying, encouraging, letting him struggle, over and over  until he mastered this right of passage.

He did good in many different ways. I did too. All in all a very satisfactory father/son bonding experience. Hope springs eternal.