Things I Like About Living With Teenagers

Things I like about living with teenagers:

1.  Waking up a teenager in the morning allows me to indulge my sadistic side.  ("It's a lovely sunny morning, and school starts in fifty minutes!")

2. It's great practice in learning to tolerate and respect cultural differences.  Cultural differences like how long it is really necessary to spend in the bathroom, and the importance of hair (including, but not limited to, the hair on your head).

3. Teenage boys are natural minimalists.  Why bother carrying food to the table when you can just save yourself the effort by eating it straight out of the fridge?  What is the point of a washing basket?  Why do we wear socks indoors?  (For boys with Aspergers' Syndrome, this may be just 'Why do we wear socks?')

4. If I didn't have teenagers, I might have bought Adele's album '21', but I probably wouldn't be able to sing along to all the tracks.  And I would still think Plan B was what you turned to when Plan A failed.

5. If I didn't have teenagers, I would still be punctuating my texts.  And I would still think 'lol' was 'lots of love'.

6. They make you see things you already love as if for the very first time.  Sometimes you can share your favourite books, and films, and paintings with them. (OK, sometimes not - we've all been there!)  They are amazed by things that you have started to take for granted.


7. Everything looks good on a teenage girl. No matter what size or shape they are, or how many zits they have. They could wear lederhosen and get away with it.  They have a sort of bloom on them that overcomes any fashion disaster.


8. If you like cooking, they like eating.   Younger children can be infuriating with their picky habits.  Teenagers just eat whatever you put in front of them. They will ask for seconds.  This is rewarding.


9. They still look cute when they are sleeping.