Do you remember what it was like to be seventeen? I do! It was horrible. I think Janis Ian summed it up best in her song 'Seventeen' - now how many people remember that?

Seventeen is the age when you are so ready to grow up -- you know so much more than your parents - after all they are stupid, what do they know? You're not really a kid anymore, and you're not really an adult, but your sure want to have all the priveleges that go with being an adult, but none of the responsibilities that go with it.

Seeing how devastating broken homes can be on children, it is no wonder that there are more and more teenagers wandering the streets these days. We as parents will do anything we can to make sure our own children are safe. But sometimes I wonder if we are being blackmailed. I have been a single parent for a very long time, and let's just say that the other parent has been much more like a child than an adult. He always manages to swoop in and be 'the good guy' just in time to make me look like the evil witch of the west.  I can only hope someday these kids will realize the truth, but living through it has been less than fun. Now, I have the ultimate pleasure of watching my seventeen year old daughter move out with her boyfriend and become an 'adult.' 

She doesn't have a job. She's going to college. He has a job and is never home. How long do you think this 'honeymoon' will last? But that's okay...I'm not seventeen and I don't know anything! Sometimes tough love is tougher on the person giving it than on the person receiving it.

Hmmmm....maybe the next novel is born..............