The trick to being smart is knowing when to play dumb.
~V. Alexander
My son has always been a great student. He was always in advanced placement classes in high school. My husband and I have always said he is “book smart” and we are very proud of him but, on the other hand, he doesn’t have much in the way of “street smarts.” And we all know that you need “street smarts” to get along in the world.
When you have a responsible son, you can trust him with things like credit cards, even in high school. So we gave him a Chevron gas card. But our son couldn’t get it to work, no matter how hard he tried. Finally, my husband went to see what the problem was — was our book smart son putting the card in the gas pump upside down or backwards?
My son had a sheepish grin on his face when he came back home. My husband just smirked. Of course the Chevron gas card hadn’t worked… my son tried to use it at a Shell station.
I tried to do everything I could to prepare our son for life away at college. I taught him about banking, cooking, which gas card went with which gas station, and even sent him off with a first-aid kit.
I must have done a good job. The first quarter of college went off without a hitch. He did very well in his classes and seemed to settle into college life without too many questions or problems. My husband and I felt great about how mature our son had become and were so proud of his ability to live independently.
Thanksgiving came along, and our son was coming home, flying alone for the first time. Still not ready to completely give up my “mother” responsibilities, I checked him in for his flight from my computer, texted his boarding pass to him, and arranged for the shuttle service to pick him up at his dorm and take him to the airport. All went well. I met him at the airport when his flight landed and he proceeded to share his flight experience with me on our drive home.
“I really lucked out, Mom,” he said. “I was seated between two hot girls.”
This surprised me because he is on the shy side, so my question was, “Did you talk with them?”
“Yes, I did.”
He then told me the three of them talked about a bunch of different things until one of them started feeling sick. The plane was almost empty, and with so many rows of vacant seats, she decided to lie down in her own row. He and the other girl kept talking.
We got home and as our conversation continued, we heard lots of stories about school and college life. Then we all went to bed. While lying in bed, I reflected on the many stories he had shared, including the one about the “hot girls” on his flight… and then it hit me. Why did he sit between the two girls with all the empty seats that were available on the plane? That would be very out of character for my shy son.
In the morning I met him in the kitchen and asked, “Why did you sit between those girls if there were so many empty seats?”
His response was: “I had to sit there. That was my seat number.”
Seat number? Your seat number? I began to laugh so hard.
You see Southwest Airlines does not have assigned seats. Between giggles, I explained that Southwest has what they call “festival” seating. Another foreign word to him. He didn’t have a clue. I explained that is what it’s called when you go to a concert but do not have an assigned seat. You sit anywhere.
He looked at me with a confused look on his face. “But Mom, I checked and the boarding pass you gave me had my seat assignment… B12.”
“Oh no! That was not your seat number; that was your boarding group number.”
The reality of the situation hit him. We laughed until tears were running down our faces. Those girls must have thought this 6’2” cute guy was so self-assured and bold… or crazy… that he wedged himself between them in a middle seat on an almost empty plane. When we finished laughing my son said that he had actually never felt so confident and he had even asked one of the girls for her phone number. I guess in this case it was good that he wasn’t so street smart.
And I guess no matter how hard we try to prepare our kids for life’s adventures there are always things a mother forgets to teach her kids. Again, in this case… maybe that’s not such a bad thing!
~Michelle Campbell
