…after one’s own puberty. How embarrassing and pervy feeling. On a recent trip back to the old neighborhood, I was stunned when I realized this tall, dark, handsome feast for the eyes and ears (he has a great voice too) was the scrappy ten-year-old I knew when I was finishing up my senior year of high school! Yes, I now feel old, despite being in my early twenties, but…
well…
…the real-life realization of the veracity of “Thank Heaven for Little Girls (Boys)” honestly brings a bit of a silver lining to it.
Even more embarrassing was the fact that I stood next to him and mocked his parents’ remodeling efforts on the outside of their house, because, again, I didn’t realize it was him.
Ages 5-13: attended mixed schools, fell kind of in love with a nice girl called Janine.
Ages 4-17: attended a boys-only school, never saw Janine, sometimes thought of her.
Age 18: attended mix sixth-form classes … holy shit! Here’s Janine! Wow!!!
Let’s just say she, ummm, changed. For the better, I might add.
What’s even more uncomfortable is seeing cousins in their late teens and early 20s for the first time since they were, well, under 10. In a bikini top, no less.
best one I can come up with. A slight, awkward sort of girl in about 6th grade. Saw her in 10th grade and let’s just say… she filled out in a lot of good ways. A lot of guys were after this girl then, where in 6th the best you’d get is “oh she’s alright to talk to sometimes”.
Oh, God, wait until it’s your own son! Eeeeeeew! Yet, day by day, he keeps looking more and more like a certain young man I found very attractive once upon a time - namely, his father.
(Yesterday I noticed his upper arms are no longer little-boy shaped. His forearms have been muscley for a while now, but yesterday his upper arms caught up.)
Oh my God, is that what happens? Makes sense, but how do people deal with such an weird emergence? Still I guess it’s much worse when you’re on terrible terms with the dad, only to see him grow up again right under your eyes.
A coworker of mine is big into putting slide shows onto his PC as screen savers. We had the pleasure of watching his daughter grow into a superb hottie. The vacation pictures were the best.
One day, he had some older pictures of his wife and I couldn’t help but notice how closely she resembled her now 19 year-old daughter. I wondered what a weird set of mixed feelings that must for her. She’s approaching 50 and still a very attractive lady. When she sees her daughter, she had to be proud of her, but at the same time she can’t help but think, “I used to look like that.” I bet that is a little difficult to deal with.
Uh huh. There’s a reason teenagers drive their parents crazy - it’s nature’s way of preventing incest and making sure the fledgling leaves the nest to find his own mate, I’m sure of it! Mostly, people deal with it by never mentioning it, ever. I’m a rebel like that. And I AM on terrible terms (or, more accurately, no terms at all) with his dad. You’re right, that adds another layer of oogieness to it.
(And I couldn’t finish watching that link, 'cause it was just way too disturbing. That’s not natural growing struggles, that’s mental illness!)
It’s almost as weird seeing his little platonic girlfriends growing up. Last summer, they all (6 of 'em, all at one campground we go to every May), suddenly showed up with boobies. I don’t know who was more disturbed - my son or me! I’ll never forget his face when he jumped out of the car after a 6 hour car ride and heard the shrill little voices of these girls he’s grown up with calling his name - only to turn around and see 12 BOOBIES! in bikini tops. Deer in headlights, man, deer in headlights. He turned away and suddenly became very preoccupied with unpacking the car and wouldn’t speak to any of them all weekend. They kept asking me what was wrong with him, and I just said, “Boobs. You got boobs. Boobs melt boy’s brain.”
This is something I’m fighting right now. My 10yr old is going through a stage where she is almost the spitting image of her father AND she’s at the stage where she lies alot (which he does constantly) to try and get away with stuff. It is sometimes very, very hard to see her as herself and not a mini him.
I was at my aunt’s pool, 22 years old. Thinking, that girl’s body is F-O-I-N-E! Yeah, it was my cousin. My YOUNGER cousin. She was 14, looking like 20.
Ahh, yes, my brother is fourteen now and keeps bragging about how strong his forearms are. We can’t help but snicker every time he makes some comment about it, though. I don’t believe he knows why we laugh.
It’s very freaky to watch him go through puberty, since when he was younger he looked exactly like me at that age. And so now it’s like seeing what I would have looked like if I’d been a boy instead of a girl. Apparently, I would’ve been a very attractive guy.
This morning, Hallboy (who is almost 13) and I went to Dunkin’ Donuts before I dropped him off at school. I was sitting in the car while he went in and joined the rest of the people in line. I was messing around with a few things in the car, but then I looked up, through the window of the store for Hallboy–only I couldn’t see him. At first there’s that rush of panic when a mother can’t find her kid where she thinks he should be, until I realized that the tall kid at the counter (who I had mistaken for a MAN) was Hallboy.
…Next month, he’ll be taller than I am. By the end of the summer, he’ll be even taller and he hasn’t even hit a major growth spurt yet!
I did a lot of childcare work when I was in my teens. From time to time, I encounter one of the boys I used to babysit, and the boy has grown up into an adult hunk. This makes me feel very uncomfortable. Even when the “boy” is now a 40-year-old man, my mental image is still that of a prepubescent kid, and I feel like a perv.
Once I visited a food court at a local mall and ordered a sandwich from a gorgeous guy at a Chick-Fil-A. The guy’s eyes widened, his stupendously handsome face blossomed into a smile, and he said “Why, you used to change my diapers!” (Which, in fact, was true). Try explaining this to a bunch of amused bystanders.
– a line from “Gigi”, which was from Colette’s novel. In real life, Colette very much enjoyed affairs with younger men, including her step-son Bertrand. Their affair started when he was sixteen and she was forty-six.
You have some mighty big shoes to fill, pizzabrat.
Over the last couple of years my youngest has grown up from kid to young woman, but I still think of her as my littlest. I have to make a conscious effort to remember she’s as old as she is, sometimes. Several times in the past two summers I’ve looked across a softball field and thought, “Wow, that’s a pretty girl out there,” only to realize she’s mine. Seeing her briefly as a stranger, out of context, is really weird.
Mostly, people deal with it by never mentioning it, ever. I’m a rebel like that. 
And I AM on terrible terms (or, more accurately, no terms at all) with his dad. You’re right, that adds another layer of oogieness to it.
