Two years away from home has taught me a lot, and not just what to expect in my fast-approaching post-grad life.
I've learned that 8:30s are best avoided and securing an on-campus job isn't far removed from the Hunger Games. I've come to understand that the dining hall's a glorified, food-focused mosh pit and, above all else, I was just misinformed at the flipping of my high school graduation tassel.
Despite revelations of campus's good eats and unique treats, the biggest lesson of all falls in an uncomfortably familiar cliché: distance makes the heart grow fonder.
Coming into college, my parents felt like more of a burden than a blessing because, if I’m being honest, I never cared much for those tip-toed nights sneaking out of the house and breathless mornings hoping to make it upstairs before dad was up and brewing his coffee; needless to say, those sneaky situations seldom worked out in my favor, but that never seemed to keep me from pushing the resentful, parental boundaries looming over me.
To anyone in the first quarter of their life, parents sometimes feel like the indestructible brick wall positioned between us and anything pleasurable. Everything our millennial minds consider “normal” seems so foreign to them and, sometimes, we feel like they were birthed into adulthood—having endured some sort of Benjamin Button experience. They just never seem to understand.
The point is, parents nag, negate and always have something to say—even when we beg them to just leave us alone. It’s something I’ve resented and always said I won’t put my children through.
Looking back on all the verbal, “you’re the worst parents ever” daggers I’ve thrown, maybe I will put my children through some of the coming-of-age tests my parents unapologetically made me endure. Realistically, the unwanted critiques and seemingly strange rules situated me where I am today—sitting at the end of Childhood Ave., just waiting for the right-of-way onto the road to my future. Plus, I know I'm living a heck of a better lifestyle than my 16-year-old self found ideal, smoking overpriced Marlboro cigarettes—almost as embarrassing as the fluorescent Osiris sneakers I once proudly wore.
Albeit unhealthy, college doesn’t exactly leave a lot of time for relaxation and, in turn, reflection; however, anytime I find my stress-suppressed lungs at rest, finally taking a few rare, slackened breaths, my mind always travels to my Mr. and Mrs. Incredible, 300 miles away and carrying on their lives among the mountains.
The parents I pinned as nuisances not so long ago, now, seem like the brightest lights at the end of this never-before-explored, college tunnel. I’ve realized that even in my unavoidably self-focused situation, my parents have always stayed positioned by their phones, waiting for a between-classes text or quick during-dinner call. It’s likely they’ll answer after a brief ring and, if not, there’ll be an explanatory, “call back in 10” text that follows.
As the years stack up, so does our understanding of the motives our parents have held; we start seeing that being forced to sneak around, pushing through those late-night creaks, wasn’t the worst thing after all. In fact, it was one of the best.
All the times spent dodging and avoiding our parents stemmed from their want for us to live better lives than they ever could. They learned from their mistakes, and we’re the test that puts their newfound understanding to use.
The uncomfortable pre-grounding conversations and “don’t do it again” agreements set a precedent for our unshaped minds—a precedent that there's right and wrong, good and bad. While I envied my peers whose parents encouraged all the partying and let them run rampant, I now see how much of a disservice that parenting style can be. Granted, there's no official "how-to" on parenting, and I'm sure my future parenting ventures will be no less than comical, but I'm thankful for my parents' persistent and consistent approach to raising what I'd call a once "challenging child."
"Strict" parents, the ones we dub fun-killers and dispassionate, are sometimes the ones we should be thankful we have. There's no right and wrong to parenting, but, in many cases, they can have an approach no-less-empathetic. The rules and regulations keep us from experiencing the "bad" in the worst ways possible, keeping us focused on the "good" until we can handle the unfortunate and unexpected that life can bring.
