Hard to impress my son

[john whittaker]

My son and I were inseparable for the first 14 years of his life. The last 6 years have been spent with him staying as far away from his dumb old square dad as he could. Typical teenager stuff....This past weekend he asked if I could help him make new "custom" speaker enclosures for the 12" subwoofers in his trunk.

We spent a lot of time together in the shop making his boxes. It was a very good experience to spend some "quality" time together. When it came time to cut the round +11" holes for the speakers, I grabbed a piece of 1/4" plywood and made a quick circle jig. He couldn't figure out what the heck I was doing. I fitted the jig to the router base, nailed it to the MDF, set the depth and zipped out a perfect hole. No big deal but he was impressed. I heard him talking to a friend telling him how the speaker boxes were "professional" and turned out a lot better than he expected.

Ahhhhh It used to be easy to impress the little tyke. Now...not so easy but it was sweet to do something together again. Just hope I don't have the neighbors too mad at the 1500 watts of BOOM BOOM BOOM. At least we can hear him coming. :o

[Jim Hager]

Been there and done that with my boy too. Hang in there, the little devil in him will begin to go away a little at a time. My boy is now 23 and has made most of his furniture in his house. We spent as much time as possible together when he was coming up and looks like some good stuff rubbed off on him and thankfully a lot of the bad didn't. If he will let you spend a bunch of time with that boy even if all you get to do is build speaker boxes for him. Pretty soon he'll be building them for his buddies without your help. That means that he is watching his ole man.

[lou sansone]

I have a son who is 23 and I know what you are talking about. Hang in there and don't surrender the postion you have as his father. Boys need the influence of men in their lives, the first line of responsibility is from his father. Glad to hear that you have a good time together.


lou

[George Robin]

Hello guys, Hope I can add something to this.

I just turned 36, so I'm not too far from your sons' ages. I can remember growing was a PITA. All I wanted to do was be independant. I had learned a lot from my dad. Him being VERY old school was tough. Tough love, but he would have done ANYTHING for me.
A couple years ago (3 years actually) we got into a heated argument, where I learned he was still holding something against me that I did when I was 15 (something really sutpid that hurt his feelings). Well, he realized that I'm not the same idiot I was.
We grew a lot closer after that. Then, as bad luck would have it. He got brain cancer this January and passed away in April. I thank God every day for the time we had together. And also for the time to correct past mistakes. We were able to talk about all this when he first got sick. I just hate losing him, especailly so soon after we started to understand each other.
Having a 14 year old daughter, I can only hope we don't fall away like me and my dad.
I truely hope none of you have disagreements that you can't look beyond. Because you never know when you will never be able to say "I'm sorry".

Hope this helps someone.
George

[Bernie Weishapl]

John,

It will get better. I know from about age 16 to 21, I was a dumb as a 2 X 4 in the wall. We started about 7 or 8 yrs. ago to spend more time together.Now that he is 34 and has 3 kids of his own ya know all of a sudden old dad now has a Phd. He now calls all the time for advise and my opinions now mean something. So hang in there it will get better.

Bernie

[Don Baer]

John;
Been there done that My now 27 year old thinks I'm the worlds smartest man. Ten years ago he thought I was the worlds dumbest man. Now he is married, and had a 1 year old daughter and knows why I did what I did when he was growing up.
We are closer now then we have ever been.

[Bruce Page]

They usually come around at age 30 or so. My son will turn 35 next Feb. We've grown closer these last few years. It's almost as if he figured out that dad's not as out of touch as he once thought. ;)

[Dave Malen]

My son ,who is now 27, went through the same stage. Every kid does. About 12 or 13 you begin to be viewed in a more critical way by your children. It's only when they get into their 20s that they start to "forgive" you for not being perfect. So Hang in there!

Dave