Basil insisted on driving the first hour out of Fort Worth on our South Padre Island vacation. He has a strong sense of ownership over my minivan. He said he was there to make sure we kept it clean, no snacking. I sat in the passenger seat because being an adult gives me front seat privilege. I didn’t pay much attention to Basil’s driving because he is a good driver and instead let myself daydream, occasionally looking over at my young man son.
Once Basil got his license, he took a job at Albertsons as a courtesy clerk. He came home thrilled with his job and happy to be making money. His goal for the summer was to save up enough to buy a new gaming personal computer. My goal for the summer was to have him spend his time doing something besides sitting in front of the computer. His job worked out great for the both of us. Basil enjoyed talking to the customers while taking out their bags and said the old ladies gave him tips when he took their groceries out to their cars and loaded them up.
A friend of Mike’s whose kids also attend St. Peters saw Basil working hard and offered him the opportunity to come work for him on a surveyor team. Basil gave Albertson’s a two-week notice and went to work twelve-hour days outside in the heat of summer. He loved that job too!
After his first day there, he told this story at the dinner table.
“There was a huge blockade of vines and bushing stopping us from passing. They handed me a machete and said, ‘you can use this right?’ I said, ‘yes,’ because I knew exactly what to do. I raised the blade above my shoulder and with a quick swing and a flick of my wrist cut through a huge section of the vine. Then I hacked away for five minutes and cleared a path.”
I felt a rush of pride in my strong son but was concerned about his machete experience as we don’t own one ourselves. I asked him, “Basil, where did you learn to use a machete?”
He shoveled another forkful of meat in his mouth and grunted, “Camp.”
I had visions of the leaders of Basil’s church camp handing out machetes to all the teen boys and singing, “Bringing in the sheaves.”
“That’s definitely the best part of the job!” Basil said and added, “I wonder if they’ll let me use the chainsaw.”
He had a sparkle in his eye that made me wonder if he was teasing me, but I had to not think of it and trust that the men that Basil works with have some sense.
Basil later clarified that he used one when he went camping with friends.
I looked over at Basil who was bopping his head to classical music. He looked happy and carefree. He also looked tan and filled out. His job has been good to him.
I thought back to another work story. Basil had another adventure on the job a week later. Mike told me about it when I was on my Washington trip. Basil had been sent to run errands for the guys. He was traveling down a country road with three lanes, the middle lane for turning. Basil was driving down the middle lane, preparing to turn left when a truck in the oncoming lane also switched to the middle lane and came straight at Basil in some strange game of chicken. Basil panicked and swerved but overcorrected. Instead of moving to the right lane, he ran himself right off the road. He slammed on the breaks and came to a stop but only after crashing into a light pole. Basil let out his breath relieved to have survived an incident that could have ended badly. He took stock. The other car had driven off. Basil was fine. The vehicle seemed fine. And then a huge piece of ceramic fell from the top of the pole and smashed the windshield. We have a court date set up in August where Basil will have to say he’s sorry for damaging public property and pay a fine. He said the policeman was nice about the whole thing. I supposed that it was almost inevitable that my teen boy driver would have an accident soon after having his license.
We were in a long, straight stretch between small Texas towns with no people or cars in sight. I looked out the window and noticed that the farmland was zooming past in a blur.
Basils said, “Weeeee.”
I turned to check the odometer and saw that Basil was flying like a bat out of hell, driving like a sports car driver on the autobahn, going really fast.
“Basil, I think you should slow down and keep to the speed limit.”
“I know, Mom. I just had to see if I could do it.”
He braked till we were back down to sixty-five and grinned at me.
It’s hard to stay mad at him when he charms me.
I found out during the trip that he had broken up with his girlfriend who won’t be coming back to Basil’s school in the fall. He kept that under wraps for weeks. He tells me there’s no story to be told there.
Basil has one more week before I send him to the Antiochian Village church camp in Pennsylvania for two weeks and then school starts. I hope they don’t bring out the machetes. He seems content with his summer. I am too. He worked at a couple of jobs, made money enough to buy himself a new computer, and is now outside painting the backyard fence with Jonah, Xenia, and Basil’s friend Marcus to make some extra money for end-of-summer fun.
There are many ages and stages that I would never want to try but Basil makes being a sixteen-year-old boy look like a lot of fun.
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