My son marked his territory...

My girls are teenagers.  My son has to spend a lot of time analyzing and strategizing conversations to be heard.  A split second and someone takes a breath between words.  He dives into a half-thought before being scolded for interrupting.  For whatever reason, there seemed to be a lapse in vigorous discussion that day.

My son took advantage. “Mom?”

“Mm-huh?”

“What’s a trent?”

“Sorry, bud.  What’s a what?”

“A trent.  See.  On that van in front of us?”  All my kids craned their necks to see around heads and headrests.

On the dirty rear window where it should have said “Clean Me” in thick finger-writing, it read “Trent: 92% Calc. Final!!!”

I laughed.  “That’s a boy’s name.  He got a 92% - an A – on his calculus final.  Looks like someone is proud of him, bud.”

One of the girls spoke up.  “Calculus is REALLY hard.  He did pretty well.” 

“Oh.”  The quiet drew over our van again.  Necks withdrew back into quiet shoulders.

I turned to back our van out of the school parking lot the next morning.  And I laughed at what I saw.

My son's own finger-writing. “Trent: 92% Calc. Final!!!” was now on our dirty rear window, but in a mirror-image.

He marked his territory.  He stuck a flag on island beaches.  But he didn’t claim it for himself.  He claimed it for the people of the land of Trent.

Trent – Looks like someone is indeed proud of you.  Calculus is REALLY hard.