Running from the Pursuer (part 1)

At the top of this BLOG under the title, I wrote a short description of what my BLOG is all about. Part of that description reads ‘…and knowing that at times the path will become less clear. More wilderness than trail, hazards and distractions will spring up and will attempt to lead me from the path...’ A week ago this past Thursday evening decidedly started us down a path less clear and definitely full of hazards. A good share of you already know a lot about this, but please read on…

‘Dad, we need to talk…’ I had just gotten home from work and I really just wanted to change my clothes and unwind a bit, but I said, ‘I know…let me change first.’ Earlier in the day Trevor had emailed me to ask me to think about letting him move back to Baraboo. I immediately thought, ‘He’s GOT to be out of his mind! He’s 15!’ I emailed him back, telling him that I wasn’t going to discuss this via email and that we’d talk when I got home. I had already updated Lisa about what was going on, so, I changed my clothes, told Lisa I was going into the ‘lion’s den’ and headed downstairs. Trevor wanted me to allow him to move back to Baraboo and He explained to me that he had already made arrangements to move in with a friend of a friend who was 21. I listened to him, thinking to myself that he’d made all of these arrangements and plans without even once consulting me. Not surprising really, I guess, if you knew deep down that your parent would say no. I told him no, that I couldn’t nor would I allow that to happen.

What ensued was a discussion where he tried everything he could to convince me to honor his request. Through anger, harsh words, tears, pleading and guilt, Trevor used everything he could to try to persuade me that he should be allowed to do what he wanted with his life…at 15 years of age. I must admit, there were times throughout our debate where my emotions swung from my heart going out to him, to just simply wanting to tell him, ‘No and that’s that!’ I feel that I was patient and stayed with the logical approach; that he’s 15…that he’s my responsibility, that he’s my son and there would be no way I could just abandon him and that it’s not even legal for him to be on his own. He countered by saying that he didn’t want to be my responsibility, nor my son and that I basically abandoned his emotions when I moved him from his friends. Round and round it went for two hours with me not budging and Trevor not letting it drop. Sigh…I knew this was NOT going to end well. I finally told him that the conversation wasn’t going anywhere as neither of us were going to concede and that I was going to go eat some supper. He said, ‘I can’t believe you’re just going to walk away’ and then hit the wall with his fist as hard as he could, putting a small crack in the wall (we didn’t find this out until later). A couple of hours later, Trevor came up, rummaged through the kitchen and all but stomped back downstairs. Noticeably he had a bandage on his hand (from hitting the wall) and Lisa seeing it, asked me about it. I told her it’s probably from him hitting the wall earlier. She didn’t know that he had hit the wall and after checking it out and seeing that he’d actually put a crack/dent in the wall behind the bar downstairs, she gathered the computer keyboard and mouse. Then went to Trevor’s room and asked for the phone. He asked why and Lisa said you punched a hole in the wall and you are grounded from the computer and all phone privileges…he told her no. Again, she told him to give it to her…he told her, ‘I don’t think I will.’ That’s when Lisa called to me; so I went down and demanded the phone. At first he told me no, but finally did say that he didn’t have it, that it was out on the bar. I went and retrieved the phone, but as I headed back up the stairway, Trevor’s door opened, he threw something out against the opposite wall and then slammed his door. I went back down to see what it was…it was Lisa’s car keys. I showed them to Lisa and she said, ‘We need to talk to him, find out what’s going on…was he planning on stealing the car?’ So, I went downstairs and told Trevor we needed to see him upstairs now…(to be continued)

~V