Just Being Seventeen

         "Just being seventeen," was Sharon's explanation for Valaria's behavior. I don't think so. I've raised two children of my own and help raise two grandchildren so that explanation was far from satisfactory or accurate from my perspective.
         There is a plethora of syndromes, illnesses and other medical maladies that use acronyms as names. There's ADHA, PTSD, and ODD. Attention Deficit Hyper Activity, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and my personal favorite, Oppositional Defiance Disorder. Add all of them to Attachment Disorder and Adoption and the explanation 'just being seventeen' takes on a whole new meaning. To borrow from It's a Small World and you have a world of laughter and a world of tears.
         Sprawled across the black futon, still in her pajamas at nearly three in the afternoon, Valaria was her typical teen-aged self being more concerned with what was on the new 40 inch HDTV her mother just bought for the playroom than she was completing the one chore her mother assigned. Sharon wanted to get her laundry started but couldn't until Valaria transferred hers from the washer to the dryer.
         After four or five polite requests to Valaria to complete this task Sharon got annoyed. Believe me when I tell you that I would have lost it after the second request. "Your not wanting to take care of your chores is preventing me from doing mine." That's way milder than what I would have said if it were me, but whatever. The response she got back was what would have sent me into a rage of biblical proportion, "If you're in that much of a rush to do your laundry than just do mine and get over yourself!" Excuse me? I know I didn't just hear that.
         It didn't matter to Valaria that her mother just bought her not one but two HDTVs that same day (one for the playroom and the other for her bedroom). All that mattered to Valaria was Valaria.
I should preface this situation with the fact that the day before we had all gone to the mall so Valaria could go shopping with her friend so spend her birthday money ($500 from her mother) for new clothes. While we were in the store we noticed that Valaria's purse looked more full than when we left the house. As she was known (by her mother and the police) to have engaged in shoplifting before Sharon euphemistically asked, "You're not borrowing anything are you?"
         "No, Mom, I'm not borrowing anything. Why do you always have to ask that?" The bellicosity was astounding.
         Sharon and I just looked at each other. The pair of shorts that Valaria had in her hand was exactly the right size but immediately after answering her mother she walked back to the rack, said the shorts looked too small, grabbed another pair and went into the dressing room. When she came out we proceeded to the checkout counter to pay for the ones in her hand..
         Back to the present: as Sharon was shaking out the twisted mass of wrinkles the spin cycle created in Valaria's laundry lo and behold, a skirt and top Valaria admired from the mall the day before (and didn't pay for) along with two plastic Zip Lock bags of weed were found.
         Completely forgetting that she told her mother to 'do it herself' if she wanted the washer Valaria started yelling obscenities and the most hurtful things at her mother the likes of which would have been followed by an ass whipping or other horrific punishment by any other parent. Not in this house. Sharon was above that, she relied on all the psychological bull shit the family therapist dealt out.
         Sharon took the two bags of weed upstairs to the kitchen and ran the contents through the garbage disposal. Valaria came upstairs following her still screaming. I'd had about enough and decided it was time for an intervention of sorts. When I yell and scream my grandchildren usually ignore me but when I lower my voice to almost a whisper they know I mean business. In a voice barely audible I said, "Let me tell you something, young lady. Your mother is my best friend. I've known her almost sixty years and been through more things than you will ever know. I don't care that you're her daughter, I don't care if you suffer from various maladies, I don't care if you think you're God. Nobody will talk to her like that in my presence, do you understand?"
         Valaria had stopped screaming the minute I started talking. She heard everything I said but whether she was actually listening was another question. "I know you've gotten away with more crap than any other teenager and I can understand why, although I don't necessarily agree with it. The stress that you have created puts your mother at risk once again and I swear I'll see you locked up in jail before I allow you to weaken her resistance again. She's been through two bouts of cancer already. Are you trying to send her to her grave?"
         Sharon was sitting in her leather chair not saying a word. Valaria was sitting on the floor when the crocodile tears started. I wasn't buying it for a minute. "You think you're entitled to act any way you want because you have a few problems? Wrong. You know that Brandon suffers from the same things but I was able to put him on medication to control his impulses and behavior. The only reason you're not taking prescriptions is because the doctor won't prescribe them because of your continued drug use. That doesn't give you a free pass, far from it.
         "Tomorrow I'm taking you back to the store and you will return the skirt and blouse. You will tell them that you stole them."
         "They can't be returned. The tags are off and they've been washed."
         "The point of returning them to the store is not for them to put them back into inventory it's to embarrass you and teach you a lesson. They will probably take your picture and distribute it to their other stores so that if you are allowed back in there, security and surveillance will keep an eye on you the whole time."
         "My mother won't make me do that."
         "But I will. She will have at least one day of peace and quiet without having to deal with you. I will drop her off at the day spa and you and I will spend the day together."
         "I have plans with my friends for tomorrow."
         "That's too bad. I guess you'll have to call them to cancel. And by the way, after you make those calls you can hand me your phone and get me your laptop, you won't been needing them this week."