at what point

does my responsibility to my kids as far as carting their little asses around town at their slightest whim become something i'm allowed to say no to without feeling guilty and/or having to explain myself?

first off - i'm pretty fucking accommodating to all of my kids. their school's are maybe a 1/2 mile away, yet i drive them every morning and pick them up pretty much every afternoon. to be perfectly honest, mostly it's from the fact that i stay at home and consider it to be part of my job.

one child has been visiting with friends after school and on weekends, going to their houses or having them come over here. since most of them live too far to walk, i generally drive him or pick him up - sometimes both and sometimes neither one. sometimes it's not a big deal, sometimes it's a real pain in the ass (think friday - or OK, tuesday - night when all i really want to do is have a bottle of wine and chill). sometimes i bitch about it but mostly i don't, i want my kids to have social lives and would rather drive them myself than not know who the hell they are with.

anyway - i've been trying to explain to them all that even if it appears that i have nothing better to do than cater to them, sometimes it's not going to happen - whether i have a legitimate reason or not. sometimes i just don't feel like it and sometimes i feel like they just expect it and that annoys me, even though that is mostly my fault.

this child asks me last night to go visit a friend today after school and i say ok, but he has to scoop dog poop in the morning before he goes to school. he makes some stupid face and complains about what a crappy way it is to start the day (hahahaa, my sense of humor is deep within in him even if he hates to admit it) and nevermind, he would rather just come home after school. so this is where i blow it. i tell him that, ok...i'll drive him over there if he wants to come home first, scoop, and then go. stupid, way-too-accommodating move on my part, i realize, but it's what i did. so, this morning he gets up and scoops the poop before school. whoa. what? ok, cool. i thank him for compromising and saving me a trip and tell him i'll pick him up from her house around 6 tonight. he calls me after school today and asks me if i'll take him to her house because she got a ride home with some guy he hates and her house is too far for him to walk to. i tell him no that he can just come home because i don't feel like driving him there and then going back to get him a couple of hours later...pure lazyness, i can admit this. besides, if she invited him over, she should have told him that they would be riding with the Dick - she knows they don't like each other, but that's besides the point.

so he whines a bit but starts walking home. he calls me 5 minutes later as it has just occured to him that i was willing to take him over there when he still had his chores to do and he wants an explanation. well.

do i get pissed because i've contradicted myself without a real reason? do i get pissed because i'm being lazy and he's making me feel guilty? or am i just pissed because the little 15 year old fucker is challenging me and making me explain myself? probably it's all 3. we get into a verbal tussel and it just makes me madder. why the hell do i have to spend 20 minutes arguing about why i won't drive his ass to his friends house when i said i would the day before? maybe i don't have a good reason, ok? maybe the circumstances changed and now i'm annoyed that he still wants me to chauffeur him around. my question is do i really need to have a "good reason"? i generally try to explain myself to them because i don't want to be the parent that says "because i said so", but shit...after 20 minutes of his cross-examination that was about all i could say. well, that or "shut the puck up and leave me alone".


i get so frustrated with how little my kids appreciate how fortunate they are. like i said, i know that their expectations are set mostly by me and my examples - the solution to that can only start with me. my problem is in knowing how to explain to them that sometimes i really don't mind and other times it really puts me out and the difference isn't always predictable. i just want them to accept it when i say no and move on.

omg - i'm so missing my little sweet, fat, controllable children these days.