RAISED BY WOLVES

‘Does Sage live with you?’

‘Uh, yeah. Why?’ My defenses immediately went up as I wondered what happened and if it was as serious as they made it seem. I thought he might have been taken from school without my permission.

‘We wish we could have better news, but…’

Here we go again, I thought. The second day of school and I already got a call from two of my son’s teachers.

I didn’t really hear every word they said but what I got from the phone call was that one of the teachers, his Language Arts teacher, heard my son tell the class he was abandoned as a baby, was raised by wolves or bears, and took drugs. The other teacher, the Advanced Math teacher, let me know that he also got up on a table and started dancing and pretending he was smoking.

I’m not sure how I was to respond but I’m certain it wasn’t how most parents would react. I did ask whether they let him go home, to which they responded that they did.

As everyone knows, there are always multiple sides to a story.

My son’s side of the story was a bit different. Since the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, I knew it couldn’t have been as serious as they made it. I warned him that others just don’t get humour like we do. Others who might consider it a sick sense of humour. I had to suppress a few laughs myself as I listened to them tell me their version of the incidents and say that he will be the best creative writing student.

But in this case, it seems creativity was not allowed. The Language Arts assignment had to do with how one identifies oneself. My son was explaining how he was abandoned as a child in the street and since he was ‘richer than Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Bill Gates combined’, he then bribed Elon Musk to be his dad. When asked who his mom was, he couldn’t come up with anything interesting other than he didn’t have one. In his story, he also said he paid Gordon Ramsey to be his personal chef. The bit about the cocaine had to do with rhyming with one of the student’s names. The incident in his Advanced Math class involved some game where the kids walked around and asked other students for something.

‘What did his dad say?’ I asked the teachers.

‘He told us to call you since your son lives with you.’

‘Hmmm.’ Now I see where that sense of abandonment comes into play. So much for co-parenting. Or parenting of any kind.

As for my son’s explanation, he told me he was tired and bored, although he has no idea where the wolves or bears fit in as he never mentioned anything of the sort. It seems he just wanted to bring a little excitement into an environment which to him feels like prison. Certainly, most of us can relate to such a feeling but I let him know I would not tolerate such behaviour. I am hoping that my promise of him not getting to play on his iPad for the entire school year will be enough to avoid such calls in the future. That’s not to say that I expect him to be quiet all school year. Just to avoid crossing that line where a phone call to me is warranted.