Out of the Loop

My youngest son, Tucker, claims we never tell him anything. He says he never knows what is going on in our house or our family. This summer, my daughter Grace starred in a production at the high school -- the high school where Tucker goes. The play was Emma and Grace was playing Emma. Apparently, Tucker missed the fact that Grace went to rehearsal every night and posters of her face were plastered around the city and in the newspaper. The newspapers lay on the dining room table for several days. The first night of the play, one of his friends said to Tucker, "Isn't your sister starring in that play?" And Tucker said, "I don't know." That's when the friend pointed out the poster. I don't think we, as a family, keep information from Tucker. I think he's in his own little world, playing video games or on the computer or hanging out with his friends or listening to music with his earbuds in. That's how he misses all the conversations. But, just to prove him wrong, I've been making an effort to make announcements to Tucker -- things like, we're going to Florida Labor Day weekend to take Spencer back to school, so he doesn't wake up one morning and wonder where everyone went. Today, when Tucker got home from school, my husband was stacking his camping gear in the corner of the dining room. I took one look at Tucker's face and rea
lized he didn't know Earl was going on a trip. "Dad's going camping in the morning," I told him. So he trundled across the dining room to give his Dad a hug before we left to buy new shoes and he headed out into the world that is a Friday night senior year of high school. Maybe Tucker doesn't need to know what's going on with our family all the time. Maybe it's just his way of starting to separate from us in preparation for his journey to college next year.