growing kids and Disney adults

My daughter is back in school. When she was younger, I would receive a flood of information after the first day. Alas, my kid is now 13 and deep into the throes of "teenager-itis." We're lucky if there are three uninterrupted minutes of the day where she's not in her bedroom behind a locked door. So although she started Friday, information about her schooling (like most information about many non-Pokemon areas of her life) has not been forthcoming.

I try very hard to become stoic about this. She is in fact a teen, so her acting like a teen is pretty natural. Withdrawing from one's parents is in fact a normal part of becoming an adult. And it's not like I am without personal experience with the whole teenager thing (although my own personal teen years were one hundred and sixty seven years ago).

Still, it's trying. Every time I look at her, I see the person she is, yes, but then I also see the adult she's becoming and the kid she's ceasing to be. All are wonderful...but it's hard not to feel nostalgic for the version of her who would seek out ways to spend time with her father. I'm not too adult to admit that I'm needy, and her needing me less is difficult, to say the least.

Today, though, I did get to force her to spend time with me by having her fold laundry. Laundry is a weird task, because she offers little resistance to folding clothes. Same with grocery store runs...she still seems to  actually enjoy heading with me to the supermarket. There are plenty of tasks at which she lashes out as only a teenager might, but laundry and groceries are (at least for now) safe spaces.

So we're folding laundry, only taking brief breaks to pet and love the cats (my daughter opined that our cat Edalyn Clawford DuBose "looks like she's thinking of killing a man"). I ask about school, only to get "it's okay" and "it's too early to say a lot." Fair enough. I ask if she's in classes with her friends, but she's now taking all honors classes, and "I know a lot of the kids, but we're really more acquaintances at this point."

I'm getting conversation, but it's mostly in the form of baby steps until I ask my kid about her teachers. "Funny enough," she tells me while working on a towel, "most of them are hyper aware Disney adult-coded." This, of course, stops me in my tracks, so I have to ask. "You know the type of people who worshipped The Lion King and The Littlest Mermaid and such when they were young but kept that a main part of their personality even though they're adults? Kind of geeky and obsessed? That's them...but they're mostly really good teachers, so I don't mind it." She folds a washcloth before letting me know, "my social studies teacher is amazing."

It's moments like this I try very hard to engrave directly into my memories. They're also moments which make me feel the world will be made better by my wonderful child.