David Heiller
The Great Debate is
never far from the surface at our house.
Throw in the fact that
they are of different gender and opposite personalities, and some powerful
dramas can ensue.
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| Oh, those kids! |
Negotiation is one aspect of The Great Debate. A typical Negotiation played out last Sunday afternoon in the kitchen.
“Noah, I’d like you to
clean the porches,” I told my son, age 18. Just then my daughter walked into
the house. I had to think fast. You can’t give one kid a job while the other
looks on.
“Mollie, can you empty
the dishwasher?” I asked my daughter, Malika, age 16. It wasn’t really a
question, and she knew it.
Mollie started an
immediate, barely audible protest. Noah’s radar went up.
“Mollie do you want to
switch with me?” he asked her.
“OK,” Mollie replied,
and the deal was done. Mollie whipped through the two porches, straightening
shoes, sweeping the floor, giving the rugs the quickest of shakes. She worked
like lightening, no doubt hoping to beat her brother.
Noah put away glasses,
plates, silverware, and bowls with the efficiency of a Ford assembly line
worker.
Not surprisingly,
their two jobs ended at the same time. That is Newton’s Third Law of Teenage
Physics: Two jobs given to teenage siblings
will be completed by each person in the same amount of time,
regardless of the degree of difficulty of each job.
 |
| Putting kids to work starts early. |
Negotiations like this
play out almost daily in our house. They are amazing to watch. I asked Mollie
later why she negotiated. “I hate emptying the dishwasher,” she replied. How
can you hate a job like that, I wondered to myself. Then I thought, It’s
been a long time since you were a teenager, Dave.
Chore
Injustice is another part of The Great Debate. Each kid is
always on the outlook for Chore Injustice.
It goes something like
this:
“Noah, take out the
trash and empty the compost bucket.”
“What?!?”
“You heard me.”
“What about Mollie?”
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| And all of a sudden they are grown up and help with really, really big chores, like cleaning out 30+ years of debris from a hayloft. |
“What about Mollie?”
“What does she have to
do?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, if I’ve got
to do the trash and compost, what does Mollie have to do?”
“Worry about yourself,
don’t worry about your sister.”
At this point Noah has
to change his tactics, because I have been known to start adding jobs to kids
who protest too much.
“I had to split wood
for the sauna yesterday,” Noah says. He’s got a bigger strategy in mind.
“You always split wood
for the sauna,” I answer. “That’s your job.”
“My point exactly,”
Noah says with the finality of Bobby Fischer. “And what job does Mollie have?”
He is slowly and
delicately backing me into a corner.
“She does the
recyclables.”
“Recyclables!” Noah
says with a snort. “That’s not a real job.”
“Fine, then you can do
it.” Checkmate for me.
Then there is the Magnificent
Excuse, another component of the Great Debate.
Mollie pulled one out
last Sunday morning. She was practicing her vocal lessons up in her room, in
preparation for singing in church this Sunday.
“It’s good to hear her
practicing.” Cindy said. I agreed.
Mollie came
downstairs. “Mollie, can you unload the dishwasher?” I asked. Mollie pulled out
a trump card. Had she heard Cindy’s comment a few minutes earlier, even though
she was blasting out a high C at 110
decibels?
“I can’t. I’m
practicing my music,” she said like an aristocrat to the stable hand.
“Well, practice it
while you unload the dishwasher,” I countered.
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| Malika has always been willing to take on the floors. Emptying the dishwasher, not so much. |
“Dad, you know I can’t just stand and work and sing at the same time. That’s not how it works.”
“Well, what are you
doing upstairs?” “I’m working on my scrapbook.”
“How come you can work
a scrapbook and sing but you can’t put away dishes and sing?”
“Dad,” she said with a
disbelieving chuckle and a shake of her head. She walked triumphantly back
upstairs. She had me, and she knew it, and she knew I knew it. She has lived with me for 16 years. She knew I would not mind her
singing upstairs instead of five feet away from me. (Remember that decibel
level?) She knew I would like the fact that she was working on her scrapbook,
which is the most ornate publication this side of a 12th century Bible. Most
importantly, she knew her mother would be on her side. And as an added bonus,
she was practicing for church.
Game, set, match.
Well, not quite. She
did end up emptying the dishwasher a couple hours later.
The Great Debate.
Playing in a household near you. It’s better than a four-star movie.
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