Teenagers are gloriously weird. You can’t know what their mood will be from one day to the next, let alone one minute to the next.

Yesterday, my 15-year old (The Musician) was “tired” from “school” (yes, those are air quotes) and while he had enough energy to go shopping with me, he didn’t have enough to TOLERATE me asking a simple question.

Today, he had to go for a nature walk and collect items to create a mandala for art class. Without warning, he asked me to come. Did I have the time to come? Nope. Did I have the desire to go out into the natural world when there was so much Twitter to be mined? Nope. Did I go? Hell yes!

Because that’s what you do when you have a teen. You have to be ready to engage with them when THEY want it, even if that means skipping lunch and carrying a crinkly bag of cheese-covered popcorn into the woods.

While walking with him, I was totally not in the moment (am I ever?) because I was thinking about how weird teenagers are and how I should should write all these thoughts down but they should be written in some profound way, like: “There are many paths we could have taken. No one was leading. Which path we chose didn’t really matter because the destination wasn’t important; it was the journey together that mattered.” (Barf.) Oh, and because I was trying to decide how many questions to ask him.

I am pretty sure there are a limited number of questions that you’re allowed to ask a teenager. I don’t know what that number is (and clearly it isn’t evenly divided amongst all the days), but I suspect it isn’t very large. When I was giving birth to The Musician, the midwife told my husband that he was allowed one–and only one–question to ask me between contractions. Perhaps parents of teens need this rule too.

What’s the equivalent of a contraction for a teenager?

Surely a long day of online COVID-schooling has to count. I’m pretty sure friction with friends or breakups with girl/boy-friends count. For my kid, failure in Fortnite (sudden death from a sniper) is certainly a contraction: aggressively loud swearing and smashing of fists into the table are signs that No Questions Shall Be Asked. (Definitely don’t ask, “Do you think you need a break from that game?”)

But I have SO MANY questions! I am not unlike the mom in this Trey Kennedy YouTube video*. (Just watch it! It’s only 3 minutes long and totally entertaining.) Now (thanks to Trey), when I realize I am a Rapid-Fire Question Machine, to lighten the atmosphere in our house I throw in the most ridiculous question: “Were the girls appropriately dressed?” They never are. But neither are the boys.

The Musician has reached the age where he cares about how he looks. The first foray into fashion was Metal Head style: lots of black clothing, leather-like jacket (because who wants to spend that much for real leather?), and band patches on a denim vest (sleeves having been roughly cut and spots worked threadbare with a butter knife–don’t ask my why). Then it was Emo: take metal head look sans denim “battle vest” and add a lot of black eye makeup.

His newest trend is Drag Queen. He hasn’t chosen to go all out yet, but the makeup effort alone is insane. He’s spent his allowance plus all his birthday money on what seems like very few items, but is also far more than I’ve ever owned in my life. (I guess I did have a purple marbled Caboodle full of makeup that I used for the high school plays.) His eyes are frequently swathed in dark purple, black, or recently gold glitter.

The other day he did full face. He marched into my bedroom with his brown paper bag of eye shadows, liners, mascara (I hope! I recently found out he’d been using mine), blushes, and a bunch of things I can’t name and declared he was taking it over for three hours. To which I sighed, gave him a towel to put down on my dresser surface (dude, you keep getting makeup all over my dresser!), and promptly set to thinking about what kinds of makeup related things he might get as Christmas gifts. We are running out of ideas for Metal or licensed “The Office” merchandise.

I was somewhat in awe of what he was doing. Despite my cousin calling me “Makeup Massacre” every day in the 8th grade, I was never the kind of girl who put on a bunch of makeup. I started wearing eye liner and mascara back then and that’s pretty much all I’ve ever worn. Foundation always made my skin crawl, rouge makes me look like I’m trying to hide that I am dying, and somehow I can’t get lipstick to stay on–I always absorb or eat it off except for a little line around my lips (which apparently is a THING now!).

And then there is all the psychological trauma I endured when I was seven: a relative cut my hair super short and I cried because I looked like a boy, so she then applied all the makeup in her purse to my face and I looked like a clown. I still have trouble with short hair and makeup, but oddly not clowns.

At irregular intervals during the three hours he was using my mirror, I would observe and ask questions. He was watching a YouTube video, patting his face with some sponge type thing (what’s that called and how much did it cost?) while blending, blotting, lining, layering. I think. I had to leave the room as I was getting tired watching him go to all that effort—I rarely have the energy–or arm strength–to curl my hair. He looked very nice when it was done; my cousin wouldn’t agree.

Despite how pretty the makeup was, I couldn’t help but feel sad for his skin. Because while he is old enough and capable of buying and wearing make-up, he can’t seem to take it off all the way. After removing a day of Emo or Drag Queen he still looks like he’s trying to emulate the subtle makeup I typically wear. I had to reach deep into my teen years to pull out a reminder to him: you can’t just wash it off; you have to remove it first and then wash your face. Did you know that? (Another damn question.) Of course he knew it—but he doesn’t have any makeup wipes. Of course.

I’ve been wearing make-up a lot during These COVID Times because of an overuse of a certain video app; I look tired and like an old hag without it. The Musician often compliments me on my make-up or when I am “dressed up” (read: not wearing my pajamas) and it is nice to be noticed and complimented. On the flip-side, he also notices when I look “tired” (read: an old hag). Sometimes I am tired because I have kids and I have questions and I want to ask them questions and they don’t want to be asked.

Some days it’s hard. Some days I feel like a failure and I am sure he’s going to grow up to be homeless and destitute (actually, for a while The Musician said he wanted to be homeless; I’m guessing the desire to buy lots of clothes and makeup has taught him that he doesn’t want to be destitute, though).

Other days I feel like I’ve somehow managed to not screw him up too badly. Like today, when he asked me to go on a nature walk with him.

I asked a few questions and then I went.

*This is how The Musician communicates with me: videos or memes that tell me how he feels. It’s creepy how spot-on that video is!