Today is Groundhog Day, where we all wait for some rodent to pop out of its hole and predict the future of our weather patterns. But I say Groundhog Day is like raising teens, because it reminds me of the movie Groundhog Day starring Bill Murray and Andie McDowell, where the day repeats itself over and over and over and over and …
Bill and Phil, as in Bill Murray and Punxsutawney Phil, celebrating a scene from Groundhog Day.You see, teens have a way of conveniently forgetting things they have been told repeatedly. It’s as though during the night they lose their brains, washed clean for a new day without any knowledge of household rules or chores. Each day, you have to retrain them as though they never had performed these functions before. Do you find this in your house too?
For example, one day we can talk with our teen daughters in great detail about how their clothes should be neatly put away, not tossed around or piled high in all corners of the room. We’ve even conducted detailed tutorials about folding, storing and putting things away properly. The next day? Piles all over again, as though this conversation had never taken place.
Or walking the dogs. Triton went so far as to create a calendar of household duties, which hangs in the kitchen to remind us all of who is responsible for which chores on any given day. And yet still, the girls have to be reminded to walk the dogs at critical times throughout the day to avoid any accidents.
Bill and Phil, as in Bill Murray and Punxsutawney Phil, celebrating a scene from Groundhog Day.The experts say that repetition is the world’s greatest teacher. I’m wondering if the person who came up with that theory had ever been around teenagers. Or groundhogs for that matter.
