Daughter is 28. The other night she mentioned on the phone that she’d been standing on a subway platform crowded with high school and college students and she looked around and thought, “I may just be the oldest person here.” She said it was a sobering moment and not a particularly pleasant one. “You know, Mom, I got used to feeling like I was the youngest person in the room. I took a look at what I was wearing and realized I need to start dressing like a professional woman pushing thirty. So I just went to Macy’s and bought some new clothes.”
I wanted to ask if she’d gotten a simple sheath with some tasteful pearls, but it wasn’t the moment to be flip. We’ve all awakened one day to discover we’re suddenly closer to Carol Brady than Marcia and it’s a bit unsettling. If it hasn’t happened to you, this is what I have to tell you: Wait.
Daughter always felt like the youngest because she had a history of being more comfortable with people older than herself. I don’t mean two years older; I mean more like ten. Her teachers as far back as grade school consistently remarked to me that talking to Daughter was like talking to an adult. Not because she was more serious than kids her age, but because she always got it. Nothing was over her head.
Once I had a meeting at Daughter’s high school during a school day. As I passed the principal’s office, I raised my hand to wave in case he was sitting at his desk. Instead of waving I wound up stopping because he was sitting at his desk all right, his chair tilted back and his hands clasped behind his head talking to a student sitting across from him in the same position. It was Daughter. They looked like a couple of ad execs tossing ideas around. I stood in the doorway feeling like an intruder. The principal glanced up and said, “Oh, hi! How are you? Your daughter and I were just shooting the breeze.” Apparently so.
In her junior year, Daughter went on a high school trip to Paris along with some students from her grade and the year ahead. One day she called to check in and tell me all the wonderful places they’d visited so far, like the Arc de Triomphe and the Louvre.
OSV: So what’s planned for tonight?
DTR: Well, Laura and Emily are here waiting for me and we’re still trying to decide where to go.
OSV: Are they girls from your grade or two of the seniors?
DTR: No, they’re the chaperones.
OSV: Wait, aren’t the chaperones teachers?
DTR: Yeah, I was in both their classes. You remember Ms. Murphy, don’t you?
OSV: Wait again. You’re calling Ms. Murphy Laura?
DTR: No. I’m calling her Emily. I’m calling Ms. Parker Laura.
In the background I could hear voices saying Daughter’s name.
DTR: I have to go. The students are at a program tonight so us single girls have the whole evening to ourselves.
OSV: Us single girls? Listen to me. THEY’RE single girls. You’re a junior in high school.
DTR: Whatever. I really have to go, Mom. Au revoir!
That noise you hear in Daughter’s Featured Fotos is Harley Davidson’s The Art of Rebellion
rebel daughter