He just turned 17 and I suck at storytelling: I'm at the dentist with my daughter. Text comes through "My steering knuckle broke and I don’t have enough money to buy it". He's 45 min away, in the woods, it's snowing.
Im picturing driving home, getting tools, driving to him, hauling tools into the woods crawling in the mud and not being able to fix it.
Several texts later I find out he turned the drivers side tie rod (1999 2500 Sierra 4x4) into a "U". He was able to take the old bent tie rod off, got a ride to the next town, bought a new tie rod and reinstalled it. In the dark, in the cold and the mud. He drove home and I got a chance to check it out. What a great job he did! My son! Just got his license, just turned 17!
No no no! You are supposed to yell at him for the reason his tie rod broke in the first place!
Parenting 101, and it's obvious you suck at it. No offense, just some tough love as that's the best kind there is. Period.
Oh, and congrats on your little human. Sounds like he is a winner. Problem solving abilities may be the biggest indicator to success in later years in my opinion.
I have a serious hope for my daughters to be able to handle most automotive repairs needed to keep their car out of the shop. If you can keep the vehicle budget in line, it gives you much more room to work with in every other line item.
Oldest Daughter was taught to drive by me in my Porsche when she was 14 ish. Her first car was a manual. First boy that attempted to court her had a M3. He thaught he was cool. Then she showed him how to really drive his car.
She told me that she just played dumb and commented how nice his car was and asked if she could drive. Well as she put it he that this was his operaunity to show her how to drive standard. She listened to all his crap and finally told the boy to watch how her dad showed her how to do it. She then took the car on a very spirited rip through the CT back woods roads. She can heal and toe with the best of them. She told me that she thought he was going to wet his pants.
I don't think there was a 2nd date.
In reply to ebonyandivory :
I don't like going out late at night. Our state has a 10pm curfew during the week and 11pm on Fri/Sat night. This is awesome as I don't want to rescue my 17 year old with her car.
I only have 9-1/2 months to enjoy this blessing.
In reply to ebonyandivory :
I'm surprised he knew what a steering knuckle was. Fixing it is the cherry on top. You obviously have done something right,
In reply to Olemiss540 :
You don't know me but felt comfortable saying I suck at parenting? Then say "no offense"?
And you want me to yell at him for driving off road in a 4x4? Yeah, I wish he was obsessed with pot and played X Box like the cool kids do.
Sorry but I can't tell if this is a joke or not.
spitfirebill said:
In reply to ebonyandivory :
I'm surprised he knew what a steering knuckle was. Fixing it is the cherry on top. You obviously have done something right,
Thank you! Of course it wasn't the knuckle but the tie rod. I'll call it close enough!
"Hey, nice car!" OMG your wife is HOT! "Did you do this yourself?"
Sorry, NOTHING is like having a total stranger say "You done a good job with that boy".
You done a good job with that boy ....... 
Just to do that at 17 says a lot about his parents.
In reply to ebonyandivory :
I'm 95% sure that was a joke.
Mr_Asa
HalfDork
2/28/20 8:05 p.m.
Make sure you tell him you're proud of him.
One of my favorite memories is when my Dad quietly took me aside at one point during my graduation of basic training and told me how proud he was of me.
I knew he was before then, and I know he is still, but it means something to hear it.
In reply to Mr_Asa :
I screen-shotted this thread. He told me how much it means to him. I told him he was awesome like me!
In reply to 914Driver :
Best compliment ever! Thank you!
As an aside, it wasn't that long ago we had ice cream sundaes delivered to our table at a large chain restaurant. We had no idea what the occasion was until the waitress told us a customer bought them for us solely because our three kids were so well-behaved and polite.
Still brings a tear to my eye.
Patientzero said:
In reply to ebonyandivory :
I'm 95% sure that was a joke.
It had to be. I won't believe a member here would say that and not be kidding.
Hoping my kids are like yours. Nice job
I told my son if his mom was taking him out of town he needed to change her trans fluid first (Mazda6/auto) as i had noticed it was bad recently. I had zero clue he thought i was serious.
I came home from work to this:
He was 13. I know how you feel and congrats!
Great stories!
I'm 99.9995% sure that OleMiss was being sarcastic. I usually got the yelling first as a kid, so I can appreciate it.
