Take a Hike
Teenagers like choices. It gives them some measure of control.
“You have two choices: either clean the bathrooms or go on a hike with me to the lake.”
Rylan, my teenage son, looked perplexed.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“You have thirty seconds to decide,” I replied. “Twenty-nine, twenty-eight…”
“Are we going on the trail with all the rattlesnakes and mountain lions?”
“Yes.”
It was a cool fall morning, and the chances of seeing a rattler or mountain lion were slim to none. He took the full 30 seconds to decide.
“Would I have to do the toilets?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, I’ll go on the hike.”
Teenagers have opinions. Remember to listen.
“You’re trying to kill me, right Dad?”
“Possibly.”
“I am never going to make it.”
“You will if you move your legs.”
“Is there even a lake up here?”
“Yes, but we have only been hiking for five minutes.”
As the sun started to warm the rocks along the trail, two small alligator lizards popped out and began sunning themselves. Rylan froze. With a solid wall of rock to our left, and a steep canyon to our right, there was no place to run. He was trapped.
Let your teenagers become problem solvers.
“You know they always go for the smaller ones, and Dad, you could stand to lose a few.”
“Well then, I hope they’re not hungry”
Teenagers need to express themselves.
The sun was glistening off the lake and the only sounds were of nature itself.
“Isn’t this beautiful?”
“Dad, I just have one thing to say. I will never come to this lake again!”
Remember, the male teenage brain is not fully formed.
“Let’s go, son.”
“Where are we going?”
“Down.”
“Down? Back down the trail? Where’s the parking lot?”
“Where we left it, at the beginning of the trail.”
“The parking lot isn’t up here?
“Why would you think the parking lot would be up here?”
“I don’t know, I thought we made some kind of loop.”
“No loops, just straight up…and straight down.”
Teenage boys loved to be challenged mentally as well as physically.
“I think I hear a mountain lion.”
“Don’t worry about it, mountain lions are only dangerous when you can’t hear them.”
“Now you tell me.”
A few seconds pass…
“Dad, I don’t hear anything.”
Positive Reinforcement, Positive Reinforcement.
“My feet are going numb.”
“That’s good, at least they are not in pain”
“Water, I need water.”
He began to stumble, and I was pretty sure he was going to fall to his knees and start to crawl, when we suddenly heard something…
Teenagers learn best following good role models.
It was singing. Coming up the trail was a young husband and wife and their adorable little four year-old daughter. She was bouncing as she walked past, proudly sporting a Dora The Explorer Back Pack filled with stuffed animals.
We watched her skip up the steepest part of the trail, singing away.
The next few hundred feet were travelled in silence.
“Well, that was embarrassing.”
“Yes it was, son. Yes it was.”
You never know when “special time” will come with a teenager. Cherish it when you can.
For the last 25 minutes of the hike, we talked about important things like what might be for dinner, what kind of car he wanted to get some day, his teachers, and his strategy for cutting down on the 4,213 texts he had last month that landed him on this hike.
When we finally reached the car, Rylan immediately grabbed the sports drink that he forgot to bring with him and gulped it down with reckless abandon. Streaks of red Gatorade dripping from his chin, he turned to me and said, “I could so do that again!”
Writer Shaw Kobre lives with his wife and two sons in Santa Rosa, California. Thank you for your contribution, Shaw.
