Independence

I wrote about how close everything is here a short while ago and today I realized another side effect: geek-boy is  becoming a lot more independent quickly.  In Sunnyvale, because of the distances, the fact that 6 lane roads are considered “neighborhood streets”, the ubiquitousness of cars and the culture everybody drives everywhere and kids are driven everywhere.

A bike for some – a piece of independence for others
(C) Tina Baumgartner

Not so long ago, in spring, my son and I took the bike to downtown Sunnyvale – just imagine. Driving across an driveway of a supermarket parking lot we were literally verbally abused by a car driver who scrolled down the window and told my son that he has no business riding a bike and – with a dirty look in my direction – that he belongs into the back of a car.

Here we don’t have a car – that takes care of that.  I can borrow my parent’s car but by and large it is easier to just bike or walk.  By the time I get the car out of the tiny garage, maneuver it through narrow streets, park it in a no parking zone because there are no parking spots I will likely have reached my destination by bike or on foot.

The fact that things are easy to reach has dawned on geek-boy, too, smart cookie that he is, and now he wants to do things by himself. In the morning he grabs his satchel and a few Euros and rides his bike to the bakery, invariably bringing me a bretzel and selecting the thing with the thickest sugar-coating for himself.  Today he went downtown, bought an ice cream, ate the ice cream piece and fed the waffle to the birds, then he rode back home again.  He does not want to be picked up anymore from his evening PE summer class – “mom, they let kids go home by themselves.  I can do this!”

In typical geek-boy fashion he overdoes it.  When geek-husband had to get to the train station the other day our son offered to accompany him.  “Okay” I say, “will you find home alright?”  and get an eye-roll as an answer.  The he casually adds “and on my way back I’ll stop at the Pano (his favorite Cafe) for a Babyccino.”

Predictably my response was: “you will do no such thing, young man, and get your behind back here without delay and babyccinos”.

He obeyed – but it seem to have been worth a try.

And he can, although I am not always happy about so much sudden independence.  What if he doesn’t look before he crosses the street, some mad child abuser is lurking behind the ice cream parlor, the sky falls, …

I guess all mothers go through this and the typical German mother went through it two years ago, but as a typical Californian mother I expected to have control over where my little boy goes until he is 16 years old with his own drivers license in hand, I can’t begin to imagine that anxiety: new independence, hormones and a drivers license.

Maybe this allows for a bit of a staged approach to the inevitable.