Rockermoms RHYTHM

What is love?

"Without love, what are we worth? Eighty-nine cents! Eighty-nine cents worth of chemicals walking around lonely."
-Hawkeye from M*A*S*H

What is love? This is one of the most frequently asked questions in today’s society next to what is the meaning of life? Love is a hell of a thing. It is a word and feeling that keeps us going in some way or another. It can, and at the same time can’t be truly described in words.

The many kinds of loves we feel and experience help us get through everyday life. Without love of anything or anyone, there wouldn't be much to live for. There are many ways to love a person, be it as a friend, family member or significant other. There is also the love of things around us, such as the love of video games, the love of music, movies, books, food and Star Wars. Yes, that’s right, Star Wars deserves its own category of things to love. And of course, there is the love of life itself.

The love I wish to address in this article however, is a love that takes you higher than any drug known to man and brings you down ten times worse if you let it. Teenage love is something else. It’s something we think we’ll only experience once in our lifetime. Maybe we're right.

Let me start off by saying this: Your teenager is usually one of two things: A), a hopeless romantic and adventurous explorer; or B), a lazy ass or someone who shuns the idea of love. I’ve been both of these things, so trust me, I know all the angles. However, I much rather enjoy being the hopeless romantic when the feeling is mutual. A teenage boy will fall in love easier than two-minute mac and cheese is made. A girl can take over a boy’s mind like that. But when that love dies or is no longer visible to the boy, it becomes all he thinks about and suddenly, everything reminds him of her.

These aren't just certain feelings I’ve experienced; every teenage male I’ve ever known who was broken-hearted has had to take plenty of time to get over it. After this “dramatic blow” to the ego and hormone system, we seem to fall further and further if we let ourselves. This happens to everyone, but just how far they fall depends on the person. Once we look at the big picture and realize that we’re young and that girls come and go (just as guys do for girls), we reach the epiphany that we haven’t fallen far at all. In fact, we haven't really fallen. We've just gone through something everyone goes through sooner or later.

When your teen is down and out in the love department, it’s best to talk to him or her about it, of course (as if you didn’t already know this). But I believe the most important thing is for him/her to realize how much they really have going for them and to focus more on their goals in life. Your teen will move on eventually (hopefully), but a first love is still quite something to get over.

In my experiences, I’ve felt the ups, the downs, and the in-betweens of love. Through this I’ve come to realize one thing: when you love someone who loves you equally, do your best to hold on to it and don’t let it slip away. Still, there are times when you have to let it go in order to live life. As said by many people, including DMX in the song Let Me Fly (from It’s Dark and Hell is Hot), “If you love something, let it go, if it comes back to you it’s yours. If it doesn’t, it never was.” No matter how cliche and over-used, this saying is true and must be done every once in a while.

My advice to anyone interested, teen or adult, is this: in order to love another, you must love yourself first. It’s just as Sammy Davis Jr. says, “I can’t be right for somebody else, if I’m not right for me.” Too many people rush into love, and too many people don’t take the chance to love at all. There’s an opposite end of the spectrum to every opinion on love, but there's a balance there somewhere. Just remember to focus and think about what will and what won’t always be there for you. As far as I’m concerned, I myself am a teenager and I’ve got my whole life ahead of me, and plenty of love to give when it decides to come my way. Till then I think I’ll focus on another love and that, my friend, is the love of music. No matter what, there’s someone or something that will always love you back. That’s the one love you never let go of. That’s the love that is a part of you. The same love that helps to make you who you are.

What is love? I can’t explain it any better than I have, but I’ll say it again, it’s a hell of a thing.

We Walk The Streets at Night: A View on Curfew

"Once you identify a period of life in which people get to stay out late but don't have to pay taxes - naturally, no one wants to live any other way." ~Judith Martin

It is natural for teenagers, and anyone else for that matter, to truly start the day in the evening. Especially in the summertime. Being out late at night is often more, how should I say, inspirational at times. In the words of the Rev. Sam Johnson, "There's only so much you can do when the eye of the sun is watching you."

The crisp air of the night draws the younger crowd outdoors. Exploring in the late hours of the night can either be a great thing for a young group of teenagers and kids, or, depending on the group, can be a calling for wrecklessness and disaster. The latter is one reason (I think) there is such a thing as curfew.

I believe curfews should in fact be issued, but I do not believe eleven o' clock (which was the official curfew for teenagers under eighteen, last I heard) is late enough. Sure, kids should not wander around certain areas at four in the morning, but there is so much for one to miss when returning home at only eleven during these specific years of our lives.

In many ways, the idea of not being able to stay out past a certain time can definitely drive teenagers (under the age of eighteen) to want to stay out past that specific issued time. This would not be the sole purpose for staying out late, however.

There's almost a sense of freedom when you can just walk the streets at a time when there are no cars filling the streets, no stores filled with customers, and almost nobody really watching you.

This is all good, or all bad depending on one little mixture of chance. Chances of getting robbed by some homeless guy in an alley way can definitely increase at these times of night. Chances of teenagers destroying public property can increase, also. But consider, too, that the chances of anybody committing these acts can increase late at night.

Most weekend plans seem to take place in the middle of the night as well, such as going to the city or seeing a show. Another reason that eleven is too early in my opinion, is that most local or big-time concerts begin sometime in the evening and usually end well after eleven. Most the shows I've been to usually end around twelve, sometimes even as late as one o' clock.

Curfew, it would seem, is one of the things I've noticed cops can be quite lenient about. This is a rare thing. But like I mentioned earlier, it depends on the group. Let's say there are just one or two kids walking home from a friend's house-- the cop will cut them slack and pay no mind. This would not be the case, however, for a group of kids who look in the least bit like trouble-makers. By trouble-makers I mean certain officers' depictions of such a person: somebody wearing make up, somebody with long hair, or somebody wearing a trench coat or only the color black. To these groups, curfew would be enforced with as much anger as possible. To some degree it is understandable for such late hours.

In my opinion, curfews should be issued, but twelve just seems to be the better time in my head. Ending the night at eleven is ending the night on such an uneven note and number. One more hour is all I would ask, maybe twelve thirty at the latest.

One last thought: Strangely, it seems that teenagers value many of the same characteristics in lifestyle as the things most of them want to be: vampires. Why? Every teenager wants to be a damn vampire, or thinks vampires are sexy. They sleep most of the day and walk the streets at night. But that's another topic to someday be discussed.

With that in mind, I bid you farewell and happy huntings in the night. Just stay safe.

-Zack B