Before my oldest son began 8th grade at his new middle school this year, we went on a mother/son shopping expedition. Sometime during the day, he transformed from a child who couldn't care less what he was wearing to a young man who wanted to shop at the trendy stores for some cool clothes. We went to several shops and bought skater-style shoes, some cool jeans and ended up at Hollister for a couple of final purchases to round out the day. We searched through t-shirts and found a couple of logo shirts that he liked, and a bunch of t-shirts with either sexual innuendos or double entendres on them. He wasn't interested in those in the least, but found the tadpole shirt and thought it was funny. I did too. (Have you figured out the double entendre yet?, because at this point I certainly hadn't!)
We brought home his purchases and of all the new items, this t-shirt was his favorite. He showed it to his sister and brother, and put it on to go to an on campus showing of "Pirates of the Carribbean Two" that night. The next day, was his sister's turn for a shopping expedition. We visited all of the same stores and had a lovely lunch, and on the way home from the mall, she told me how much she loved his tadpoles shirt. While I drove, I thought about all of the double entendres on all of the other t-shirts, and thought how strange it was that they would have this funny little quirky t-shirt in the middle of all of the shirts with sexual overtones. And THAT"S when it hit me. DUH!!
When I explained what it meant to our 13 year old, his face turned white then red, when he realized he'd proudly worn it the night before in front of hundreds of others - college students who probably "got it" right away!
We still have the shirt - but aren't sending it to middle school anytime soon!
Yikes! I totally didn't get it... and then I did! Oh my! Your poor boy. Too bad, it was really cute before the meaning set in :-(
Posted by: Stefani | September 04, 2007 at 08:56 PM