Well, I'm not a
teenager anymore, but I haven't missed that mark by very far, and I definitely fit into this category. This past weekend, which feels
miles away, almost as if it had happened in an
alternate universe, or maybe just a
really fucking bad dream, I went home for the first time with my
lip ring. (If you care, I talk about that
here and
here.) My parents were, we shall say,
less than pleased. The kicker is that my mom
insisted that I did it only to
spite her, and that it was an entirely rebellious action on my part.
I'd like to explain here that I'm not really a
rebellious person at heart. I hate meaningless
conflict. I'm not a
stereotypically rebellious teenager. I'm not a streotypical goth, I wear some designer clothes because they're comfortable (yay, wide leg gap jeans!), I wear some random pieces of clothing because they're comfortable, or random, or I care about what they say. I attempt to do the things that I like while not just falling
blindly into either some sort of
rebellious vs. straightedge dichotomy. On one hand, I'm
vegetarian, I don't drink (for
personal reasons, not legal ones), I don't do drugs stronger than
caffeine (and I'm trying to cut back on the
coffee and move to
tea, or
nothing). On the
other hand, I have several
facial piercings. Not that any of those things define who I am entirely, but more that I do not in anyway fit some sort of
rebellious stereotype.
I figured my parents would have figured this out in the
20 years that I've been alive. I thought about this, after
having it out with my parents this past
weekend. I've been a good person all my life. Being a
good person is important to me (good by my own
definition, obviously). Getting my
lip pierced was the first time I'd ever done something my parents told me not to. Not that I haven't disagreed with them before, but I've always
argued it out with them rather than just going ahead and doing it. But, who knows...apparently
my parents don't know me at all.
The
irony of course is that I go home for
holiday, and I get tons of family asking me how the "
partying" is, and if I'm getting out and "
having fun" (
wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more, say no more!). I usually nod, smile, and reply with a "Uh, yeah...I'm having fun." It gets old..."
Hi, I'm not a stereotype, I'm me."
It's been my experience that there's almost an expectation to rebel and cause
conflict, and if it's not met, then anything you
disagree with or do "
wrong" is then interpreted as "
rebellion". I would imagine that most people do things because they
want to. I haven't ever met somebody so
petty as to do something to cause
conflict just because they know
somebody else doesn't want them to. So, for parents to feel that their "
little children" are rebelling, is perhaps an
ego trip to them. I would imagine that the vast majority of the people do not want to
rebel as they just want to
be themselves.
This
expectation to rebel, perhaps perpetuated by
bad 80's movies and
parents' own childhood, is so strong, that even if somebody is
the poster child of perfection that parents will simply believe that they aren't being told
everything, and will
imagine rebellion and
conflict where there is none. You may be thinking, "But,
{hojita}, you have facial piercings, of course your parents are going to have issues!" But the truth is, I only got my lip pierced two months ago. This
conflict with my parents has gone on for
years. I would
hazard a guess that
parental fear of rebellion is at heart a
communication problem more than an
legitimate fear on their part.