Adventures of a Teenager

Adventures of Being a Teen


By Janeal Mulaney



When you’re a teenager, you do so many things without even a single thought to why you’re doing them. You dress in clothes that are popular or maybe because the style you dress in makes you stand out in front of your peers, or they make you appear like you don’t care what other teens are wearing you are going your own way. As a teen I did both, I come from a family that leaned toward the poor, rather then the rich side of middle class. So neither my parents, nor I could always afford the nicer clothes that I felt everyone else was wearing. When I bought my clothes, I made sure they would last for a long time. If I outgrew them or they sunk, I would add material onto the pant legs of some other jeans that had already given up the ghost, or patch them with some outrageous patch. Many times it was of some devil, or hearts, it mattered not to me. I was different, I was unique, my classmates probably had another word for it, but those were the words I liked to use.

About now you are asking yourself what all this has to with adventures?

Well now the adventure will start. As a teen my parents love to go to Nashville, many of you know about Fan Fare for those of you who don’t. Fan Fare was an event that lasted one week out of every year. Any normal person could go and meet the country and western singers they loved to listen too all year around. I believe its still going on, not like it was in the seventies, but I understand it is still pretty cool. I meet a lot of my favorite artist during the week each year we went. Even though during this time in my life I tended to listen to more rock and roll, then country. Any way not only did I meet country greats; I met people from all over, from different states, to different countries. I had a blast, to say the least.

One day while I was walking around in my favorite old denim shirt with the rebel flag embroidered on the back, I was approached by this man who was asking me about my affiliation with the kkk, what the heck is that. I’d never heard of it. Okay so maybe it had been mentioned in my school during history, chances was it had been. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t paying attention that day. I tended to zone out on history if it wasn’t about something I really cared about in history. I must confess there wasn’t a whole lot that I did care about history during those years.

So when I had to ask this dude what kkk stood for, I’m sure he was kind of shocked. When he said it stood for ku klux klan. I’m sure my attitude was not what he thought it would be. I laughed not ho ho ho, more like tears falling from bending over and grabbing my sides. Seriously. Did that even exist still? Reckon so, and he didn’t like it laugh about, but hey I was from Colorado, not down south, this wasn’t civil war times, this was the just past the years of men running to Canada to evade a war that they didn’t feel like going to, or I guess now it was a police action. The decade of the flower child was just ending. We weren’t at war with black people, that I knew about. My shirt had the rebel flag, so I had to be against them, right. Why, they hadn’t done me any harm. I didn’t even know very many, at the time there were only two or three families, who lived in my hometown and I like all of them. I had not been raised racist, everyone was equal to everyone else, if you didn’t get along with someone chances are their color didn’t have anything to do with it. So I took the time to explain all this to this poor misguided man.

After all I didn’t want anyone to judge me, just because I couldn’t get a tan, which was all the rage back then, so why would I judge someone else who didn’t have to even get one. I sure the man walked away more confused then I was. I’ll bet he walked for miles still trying to understand my reasoning. To a thirteen-year-old girl, I thought it made sense.

My next encounter was with a man from a different country. I don’t even remember where he said he lived, but it was the year when teens bought shirts with one or two words printed across our chest. My shirt happen to have wild mustangs running free under the picture the words “Wild Ones” were printed on it. The man was sitting on a bench and as I walked by he asked.

“Do your parents not say anything about how you dress?”

“ Well yeah, but in the end it’s my choice, I wear the clothes that I like, why?”

“I mean they don’t mind that you advertise?”

“Advertise what?” I asked confused.

“Well earlier today I saw a girl with a shirt that the word virgin was printed across it. Why would she advertise that?”

“Well first off it was just a shirt, she may or may not be a virgin, and just because she wears the shirt don’t make it so.” I informed the oriental man, as I sat down next to him.

“I do not understand this country, or your ways. In my country we pick our sister’s husband.” He stated. Who will pick your husband for you?”

“You mean you get by with that? I’ll pick my own husband. Let me ask you this, what if you don’t have a brother who picks your sister’s husband then?” I asked.

“Well her uncle or her father would pick for her.” He stated. “Women need protected brothers know what is best for them.”

“Well in my country we don’t feel woman need to be protected that much, we stand on our own feet. Just because a man will nice in the presents of you family, does not always guarantee that he will be nice when they are not around.”

“You have a high divorce rate over here, so you women must choose unwisely, right.” He stated.

“What happens if your sister does not like who you choose, and she wants a divorce from her husband?”

“That would bring disgrace to our family, she would not do that.”

“So if the guy you pick for your sister beats her, she still would not leave him because it would cause your family disgrace. Over here if we choose a man who is mean or bad after marriage, we go home to our parents and get a divorce, we’re not disgraced he is. I like our way better. I don’t have to live without options.”

The man just shook his head and I walked away.

Like I said, I had many adventures while being a teen. Some were just too cool. Others outrageous, but I thought I would share a couple of them with you. I hope you enjoyed them.

Sanity or Insane

What is Sanity?

By Janeal Mulaney


I have asked this question many times over my lifetime, I still do not know the answer. I would tell my children they were driving me crazy. My oldest son would explain that was their job, and if I was not insane by the time they turned eighteen they hadn’t done a good job. The day he turned eighteen, I asked him whether he had done a good job or not. He said not, but then again how can you drive someone crazy when they had reached that destination a decade before he born.

I agreed with him, to everyone out there who has gone through life, avoiding the norm, you maybe considered insane by countless people.

I was one of those people if it was the normal thing to do I did the opposite, while girls were primping to look their best and fit in, I was primping to look totally different. One of my best friends told me I looked like a two-cent hooker, one day. I told her when she stopped raiding my grandmother’s closet I would worry about what she thought. In high school a two-cent hooker would not have been caught dead in the clothes I wore. For I never dressed up, nor did I own a dress. I did however own a pair of waffle stompers or as they are called now (hiking boots), if I had to borrow a dress to wear those were on my feet. My blue jeans were full of holes with patches on some, while others were left to spread open even farther.

My jeans were skin tight, and as I look back I’m sure my style of dress was copied to bring forth for this generation. Teens now pay seventy or eighty bucks for the clothes I wore in the seventies. My patches turned into decals and my embroidery turned into machine stitching. No one actually wears their jeans long enough to make true holes in them on their own, so the factories now make the holes for them. I started putting the names on the butt of my own jeans long before it was considered juicy to wear words across someone’s pants. I would embroidery my name or the name of my latest boyfriend in a heart on one of the pockets of my jeans or just above the seam of my Dittos. For those of you who do not remember or know what Dittos were, they were the name of the first pocket less jeans, they were sold through J. C. Penny’s and they had a moon shaped seam across the butt that ran down both legs of the jeans. My name had six letters in it so I would embroidery the first three up and around one hip and the other three letters going back down the other side.

So was this insanity, or just not old enough to know what a patent was? I cut off tee shirts and wore short jackets before they were popular. My friends thought I was crazy or worse. I smiled all the time, laughed over everything. Did outlandish pranks and said ridicules things that made my friends die from laughing. I never took a second of life seriously. To this day my high school friends and I stay on the phone and I always come up with some story or say something that starts us both cracking up with laughter. Insanity, is a matter of opinion what is insane to some, others call fun. Why be normal when you can be unique?

Can you say I Love You too Much

I Love You

By Janeal Mulany

Simple three little words. Right or not. Can you say them too often to the ones you love? No, because actions don’t always speak louder then words. There are times, when for whatever the reason you have to be hard on a child, a parent, or yes even a spouse. Sometimes it is called hard love, other times it is called punishment. When you do have to punish or actually demonstrate to a love one, hard love. Your actions may not express the love and concern you feel for them. So using those three little simple words can signify that you have their best interest at heart.

For example when your baby starts crawling or walking they don’t know an electric cord plugged into a wall can be hazardous, so you tell them no don’t touch, three, five, seven, ten times, but they still keep going after the wire. So you need to do something further to let them know there is consequences to playing with the wire and the wall socket. You slap their hand lightly, but hard enough for them to know they don’t touch. You need to let them know that even though you punished them you still love them. You say those three magic little words then give them a hug. Now have you said those three words too frequently?

No, you need to let the people you love now that your love for them is never to be questioned, because no matter what they do you will always love them. I have a three-year-old granddaughter; She yells out grandma, I ask her, what baby? She says, I Love You. I tell her I Love You too sweetheart. This happens anywhere from one to fifty times a day. Are we saying I Love You too repeatedly? I don’t think so. When you leave the house do you tell your family you love them, before you walk out the door? Do you tell them I love you just before you hang up the phone? What if something happened to you or them, and that had been your last chance to tell them how you felt about them? Would you still think that you told them I Love You too frequently?

The only time I think you can use those three little words too often is when you don’t mean them, or you use them as a tool for control over a loved one or to cover up abuse one way or the other. In all those occurrences it is not true love they speak of. For you don’t abuse the ones you love, or try to control them.

If you truly love someone, then no you cannot use those words to repeatedly.

Teens and Positive Rebellion

Teens and Positive Rebellion

Teens and Positive Rebellion
By Janeal Mulaney

Rebellion is a very important step to becoming an adult, not only will teen’s benefit from the experience so will their parents, and their younger siblings. There are many stages of rebellion, which accrue at different ages, during the adolescent years. During adolescence, bodies begin to mature and so does the mind. Teens will start to question, the morals, values and standards that their parents taught them. This is one of the first steps to becoming an adult. They feel that they have a right to be included in the process of the decision-making that will personally affect them. Their own insights and understanding will help decide what solution is right for them. This does not necessarily mean they will make the same decision that their parents or friends would. During this time, their siblings gain insight for their own personal future rebellion, as well as gaining more freedom from the older sister/brother’s rebellion.
As younger siblings witness their parents and older brother or sister’s conflicts, they learn from the sidelines, different ways to get through to their parents, when their own values and morals start changing. The younger child will learn that discussing a particular want or like with their parents might add more leniencies. On the other hand they may feel it is better to do what they want then face the punishment later. They may also learn where the definite line is drawn; in other words, what they cannot do until they are out of the house or after they have turned eighteen. After learning from the sparks that are ignited over fashions and other fads from their older siblings, the younger child may decide what fashions are really worth doing battle over. The younger siblings now have a better understanding and a more lenient set of parents to work with. Some issues, parents will not tolerate, even with all the discussion in the world.
Although parents do realize that rebellion goes with being a teenager, they are still responsible for guiding the teenager through the troubled fazes of this difficult time. Many teens can head straight for misfortune during this period. For this reason, it is most important that even though parents are afraid of losing their baby, they also remain calm and collected while figuring out how to handle each child with the best care possible. Friendships and other circumstances that teens are facing require parental control. Some parents have realized that stating no or absolutely not will in no way be the best answer; for some teens, these rebuttals may drive them even farther away from the people that indeed love them the most. They soon find that either saying no and here is the reason I feel this way, or manipulation of the teen in subtle ways works better to bring that teen around to the parent’s way of thinking. By giving the teen reasons, or stating the way the parents feel and why, the mother and father are helping the teen to realize that he or she believe that they are capable of dealing with that particular choice. Having teens see both sides of the situation, parents are able to help them make a clear coherent judgment on their own behalf.
With most teens, rebellion is their way of telling their loved ones that they are indeed growing up and are ready to take on more responsibility, including the teens own decisions. Through this period of time the teens are simply learning that they are able to rely on their own judgement. Even with some issues, the teen will indeed want mom and dad to be around if a mistake is made he/she still feels it is time for them to pursue their own verdict. If the teen knows that the parents will give them sound advice on subjects and explain why Mom or Dad have chosen that route; the teens are more apt to listen to their parent’s advice. Although the teenager may consult their friends or other people that they tend to admire. Many teens have rethought those decisions after a concerned adult or a loving parent has stated both aspects of their selection. Growing into an adult is a very important process.
Rebellion can be a very positive experience for the teenagers and their families, with showing the teen respect, caring, and trust though out their childhood years. Parents have established a good foundation for the adolescent years to come. One of the most essential elements is realizing that the child is flexing their wings for the first time, and the teen needs their parent’s encouragement to learn how to fly. With the parent’s belief and trust they will find that not only can the teen stand on their own. The parents will acknowledge that the teen’s judgement and intuition will be able to prepare them to become the competent, responsible, and productive adult. Improving the relationship or friendship as your teen grows will bring out the self-esteem that is essential to the teen’s development. As children grow all parents need to base their relationship on the idea of what form of kinship they want with their child in later years through communication and love this is a very easy process. Families can conquer the biggest problems with the greatest of ease, using respect, trust, communication, love, and guidance. Therefore teen rebellion can be a positive experience, for the family along with the teens.