Shelly's Thoughts. . . .

Every now and then, as a parent, you have one of those “ I am doing something right” moments. Like a few weeks ago when Andrew informed me he wanted to save most of his $400 dollars (cash, not gift cards) to help pay for his college expenses. He did say he would like to spend $50 or so on a new game for the Xbox Santa so clever delivered during the blizzard in OK, but he did want to contribute to his higher education expense. However, tonight was NOT one of those nights. In fact, tonight was enough to scare the hell out of me.

We were sharing one of those extra special mother son moments tonight – yes, we were watching The Bachelor on ABC. We watched in silence for the first 30 minutes or so . . . then Andrew began to ask questions on how things worked, why the roses were important and why all the girls seemed so young and “girly and giggly”. As I explained, I saw a glimmer in his eye – now I honestly thought “he is hoping someday he can be the BACHELOR”. Not my competitive son. Andrew is the person who will bet on just about anything – how many pieces of macaroni do think are left on my plate? How much do you want to bet that I can eat the entire container of ice cream? Or the fact he thinks he can out run, out score and out play anyone at anything.

Anyway, back to The Bachelor. He looked at me and said “Mom, do they have a show where a woman gets to pick a man instead of the man picking from all the women?” I told him yes and the premise is the same but there is one woman who gets to chose from 25 men. This is when the proud moment came. He then told me he wanted to be on The Bachelorette. I tried to explain to him the difference of being the ONE picking from many verses vying for the affection of one woman (who apparently has issues if she is one TV trying to find true love). Andrew did not seem to grasp this serious concept. I then attempted a different approach “ Andrew, do you seriously want to be trying to win a woman who is probably kissing 20 other men at the same time – comparing you to them?” He looked very perplexed and thoughtful and I was sure I had succeeded in getting my point across until he said “ I should start practicing kissing soon so I can win”. Seriously? WTF? At which point he declared when he was announced the winner of the game (note – not the woman, the game) he said he would turn to the camera and announce “Touchdown” with both hands held high displaying the “scored sign” in football. God help me – I am not sure if I should be proud or completely dismayed. All I know for sure is that I will probably need help stronger than a bottle of wine a Calgon bath.