Stay Weird

Last week my son, Justice, came home from school with a birthday party invitation from a classmate tucked in his folder. As I opened the envelope, Justice told me how excited he was to be invited; it was his first invitation since moving here to Mississippi. I scanned the details of the enclosed card. The party was at a movie theatre where the guests were to attend a movie starting at 7 pm. I sighed. 7 pm is my son’s usual bedtime. Starting a movie at that time would be pushing his limits. Then I looked up the movie they were going to watch. I was surprised to find it was rated PG-13. (My son is 6 years old, as would be near all the children in attendance at this party.) Look, I’m not about to judge a fellow mama for her parenting or choice in party venues and activities. We are all doing the best we can. All I’ll say is that in my family we don’t allow our first grader to watch anything other than rated G movies, (or PG movies, if and only if, my husband and I have watched it first and deem it appropriate). I knew Justice would be disappointed. I gently explained to him why we would be declining the invitation. Thankfully he didn’t push back much. He’s well aware of his sensitivity to movies and he had little interest in watching one that might frighten him or give him nightmares. Even so, I knew this wouldn’t be the last time our family values put a cramp in my son’s social life and I told him as much.

We have rules about movies, television shows, music, and books for our kids because at their age they’re too young to discern what’s appropriate for themselves. My husband and I pre-watch, pre-listen and pre-read things before we introduce them to our children. We set guardrails for them until they’re ready to put their boundaries in place. Our hearts and minds are so impressionable and visual images, words on a page, or lyrics of a song leave lasting imprints. How many times have our kids come home from school with a new word in their vocabulary or a new attitude they picked up on from a friend? They try it out because it sounds cool, but half the time they don’t even know what it means. (For example, my daughter recently started using the word, “Whatever,” in response to anything we said she didn’t like. Coming from her nine-year-old mouth it didn’t sound as cool as I remembered when Cher Horowitz introduced it in Clueless. (Sidenote: Becoming a parent ruined all the classic movies for me. Now all I see are rude teenagers and a lack of discipline in every scene. I empathize with the plight of the exasperated parent. Ariel, the little mermaid misunderstood by her father and in love with a man she never met, is no longer my hero. I mean honestly, what was she thinking? I used to cry at the scene when King Triton found her hideout and destroyed all her treasures from the human world. How could he?! Now I applaud his self-control. He was a single dad with seven daughters; by golly, he was just doing the best he could! ) We stopped that “whatever” habit before it had a chance to take root. Is it a “swear word"? No. But is it disrespectful and passive-aggressive? Yes, which is why it’s not a word we’ll be using in our family.

The sooner we’re exposed to graphic images or vulgar language, the sooner we become numb to it. I don’t want that for my children. I hope their skin always crawls when they see evil personified on film. I hope they always feel uncomfortable when they hear foul words. I hope their instinct is to avert their eyes when they see or read sexual content of any kind. But more than that, I pray they dare to walk away, to say “no,” to invitations, to disassociate with friends who pressure them to conform to anything contrary to what the Bible teaches them. Learning to do those things starts now and it starts small. Declining a party invitation, for example, and taking the time to explain to my son why we were saying no. That understanding is what helps him remain confident when next week at school his classmates are all talking about that movie he missed.

I hope that if I help my children understand the reasoning behind the rules now that they’re young, they will grow to accept it as a natural part of life. I know the pressure to conform from friends, teammates, classmates, and even other adults will build with each passing year. The standards of the world will often differ from the standards we hold in our home, and my kids will be left out of relationships, parties, and several other things as a result. It’s easy to be okay with that when, like Justice and this birthday party, they don’t put up much of a fight. But will I be able to stick to my guns when they’re ready to die on the hill of their growing independence? Will I be okay being labeled a “crazy strict parent”? I’d like to think so. I can’t expect my kids to embrace unpleasant labels if I’m not willing to embrace them myself. I remember all too well how important it was to fit in, look cool, and not be made a fool of in the eyes of the popular kids. Heck, as parents we still struggle with this pressure to fit in amongst other parents! When my daughter was invited to her first sleepover last summer, I asked no less than a dozen questions of the parents who were hosting. I have no doubt they thought I was an overprotective helicopter mom, but I didn’t care. In the end, I chose to only allow Providence to stay for the afternoon portion of the party, and I picked her up before bedtime. She missed out on the fun “sleepover” part of the sleepover party, but I explained our reasoning to her beforehand and she was prepared to answer for it when her friends pressed her to stay. When I came to pick her up she was ready to go, no whining or begging me to change my mind. My kids will likely always be known for having strict parents, but I hope they’ll always be known for honoring and respecting our rules just as much. We’ll be weird but at least we’ll be weird together.

Last week was a homecoming for the local high school here in our small town. I scrolled through dozens of photos on social media of teen girls in their dresses and high heels, ready for a good time. The fashion trend seemed to be, “the shorter the better,” when it came to finding the perfect dance dress. I dated myself by saying, “Do they know they’ll still look young and gorgeous even if their dress reaches their ankles?” Maxi-length dresses were all the rage when I was sixteen, after all. I wondered what the style would be when my daughter, now barely ten, reached high school. I also wondered if we’d permit her to wear a dress that left barely anything to the imagination, for the sake of not standing out. I asked my husband for his opinion. “Nope,” he said firmly. In a lineup of girls with skirts riding up, backs bare and cleavage exposed, our daughter will look like a member of the Duggar family by comparison, (even if she’s not clad in a denim skirt and calico top), and that’s just the way it will be. Will that make her stand out? Most likely. But I pray she stands out in the best way. I want her to get noticed for being different. I want her peers to see something drastically “weird” about her. They may whisper about her because she doesn’t swear, drink, party, or date boys, but I pray they also spread the word that she is kind, inclusive, loving, and compassionate. I pray she’s known schoolwide for being a friend to those that need one, and for generously giving her time to help those around her. I pray when others say how different she is, it’s said with awe and wonder, and a desire to know what sets her apart. May the rules and boundaries we set for her be what draws others to Jesus. (I am proud to say Providence already has a positive reputation with teachers and students alike for these very things. I hope she stays weird like that.)

Resisting peer pressure, secular media, and inappropriate fashion trends aren’t the only things our kids are up against. Having Jesus in their hearts will often mean the way they handle teasing, bullying, and gossip is offbeat to the rest of the world. We live in an “eye for an eye” culture, in which revenge is sought and betrayal runs rampant. No one can be trusted, not even our friends. Anything we share in a moment of authenticity could be used against us. It’s tragic. As Christians, we are held to a higher standard. Just last week my first grader was being teased by some classmates, girls he liked and trusted. The teasing became so relentless that he had a momentary lapse in judgment and retaliated by spitting on the girls, instead of using his words or walking away. He faced the consequences of course. When I heard the details of what went down, I had a mind to take down the names of those girls and go all Mama Bear on their sweet lil’ faces, but like Justice, I am called to a higher standard. So instead, we discussed the importance of turning the other cheek, hard as it may be. Grace, patience, self-control, and forgiveness wield far more power than breaking others down or retaliating in anger. We needn’t look any further than the life of Jesus for proof. Jesus bucked every tradition, broke every rule, and refused to conform. He was an outcast, a rebel, a fish swimming upstream. Where others condemned, He forgave. To whom others ignored, Jesus accepted. When others lashed out in anger, He remained quietly subdued, knowing He answered to no one but God. He wasn’t popular with the “cool kids.” He was betrayed by one of the few close friends He had, yet He didn’t retaliate. He was weird. We should be too.

I can recall with great clarity the instances in which I was “weird” for Jesus. I voluntarily left a sleepover late at night because my friends pulled out an ouija board and everything in me (ie; the Holy Spirit) told me to walk away. I resisted the persuasive pleas of a boyfriend and the onslaught of teenage hormones and said “No” before crossing a line of purity I knew I could never uncross. I never bore my midriff or donned a tube top, even when every single store at the mall displayed them as trending. I spent my summers on mission trips instead of at parties. I was weird, yes. But I have no regrets.

I could have made an exception for the birthday party. I could’ve reasoned it was more important for my son to make new friends and be accepted into the social circle at his new school than stick to our rules about bedtimes and movies. It was weird not to, and I’m okay with weird.