The Playlist - WTITYB (Whatever, Tell It To Your Blog)

I have a 14-year-old brother. His name is Eric and he’s the apotheosis of angst-ridden, problem child teenager. I think that’s putting it mildly.

He’s not just an hellion, insolent, appallingly behaved kid that makes my poor parents life a living hell, he’s a veritable shit terrorist.  I can’t really get into everything he’s done lately for legal reasons*, but let’s just say he’s a total spoiled brat, malcontent-monster that I would totally beat the shit out of if it wasn’t for the fact that he’d call the cops on me (he’s done this to my other brother several times).

I’ve even debated paying kids in his neighborhood to kick his ass – cause that’s what he needs most badly in life – but a) it would probably be difficult, I don’t know any of these kids, how would I approach them, would they believe me? And b) one of them would likely rat me out and I’d get in trouble with the fuzz and I don’t need that kind of aggravation.

Basically he causes me no end of second-hand frustration (I get a call once a week from my mom on his newest disaster), so I’m going to do what any good older brother would do, I’m going to ineffectually blog about it. That’ll show him. (Someone once asked me, “you’re his older brother, he looks up to you, don’t you try and talk to him?” Uhh, yeah, I’ve tried trust me.)

But hopefully, in the end, this will stand as living and tangible testament to how embarrassing he was as a teenager when he gets to his 20s and looks back completely mortified.

Though, I don’t necessarily need to do this – he’ll have his own physically branded proof of how truly lame he was with him fully on display each day.

Which brings me to his tattoos; he has 6 of them. (How a 14-year-old has 6 tattoos is just another really long story not for today, let’s just say, kid gets away with murder all the time)

I can’t remember them all and 2 of them he just recently acquired so I don’t know what they are, but some of them are priceless and they speak for themselves.

1. Left top shoulder: The Blink-182 logo from their last album. That smiley  face with the eyes crossed out.
2. A checkerboard on his left inside forearm. Ok, this one doesn’t speak for itself. Is he into ska? Really adept checkers player? No clue, and no, for both questions.
3. 3 other tattoos I can’t remember or haven’t yet seen.
4. <a name="stupid">The mother of them all. 1979 tattooed on his knuckles of his left hand. Hmm, both his brothers weren’t born that year, he was born in 1991, so, what exactly is special about the year 1979? Was it Sid Vicious’ death by heroin overdose? The sad defeat of Pierre Trudeau’s liberals to Clark’s PC party? No, sadly, it’s in honor of the band Death From Above 1979. Good god, I know.

I guess I will update this blog entry when I find out what his other tattoos are.
I have suggested two more tattoos though. One that says, “lack of foresight” of his arm or just Chinese symbols that when translated mean, “ask me about my grandchildren.”

I’m about to explain how he got this way.
About a year and a half, maybe two years ago, he called me up and declared, “Guess what? I’m Emo.”

I pretty much shit my pants right on the spot and dropped the phone. “Good lord, keep your voice down, someone’s going to hear you!” So I tried to tell him how utterly stupid that sounded and that he probably meant, “I’m into emo music,” which while still awful and disappointing, would have been infinitely more acceptable than declaring, “I’m Emo.” Man, 14-year-olds, they’re like acid washed jeans they’re such an eye-sore.

My friend KG rather amusingly said I would have rather him call me and state, “Guess what? I’m Gay,”  which is sad, but true.

So, he likes My Chemical Romance, Incubus, Death From Above (are the last 2 emo?) and a bunch of other shitty bands I probably don’t care to know and he has some “emo” band that keeps changing its name and I can’t remember what it is anymore.

He did have a Mars Volta like afro for a minute which was actually pretty cool when you think about it, but then he cut it for a more askewed Fall Out Boy hairdo. And he has one of those big stud ring things in his left ear that makes his earlobe look gigantic –only it’s attached to a long spike and it looks fucking ridiculous.

He also wears womens jeans and has done some male modeling. (Man, you’re gonna really want to punch me in the face in a couple years, huh? )

He’s on myspace (of course), but there’s no way I’m linking to his page. He’s also on the verge of getting kicked out of school and is likely up to no good as we speak. He thinks he’s going to be a professional skateboarder when he grows up. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

In the end, he’s incorrigible. He’s just going to have to go through these teen growing pains and hopefully learn from them, but man, he’s going to be kicking himself in his early 20s when he has to save up a shitload of money to get those embarrassing and laughable tattoos removed. One will hope that will be a huge lesson in itself.

Poor stupid teenager.

I’m also really personally embarrassed to tell this story, as it reflects pretty poorly on me (WTF? Didn’t you try and get him into good music???), but I swear he has a whole bunch of Cure, My Bloody Valentine, Joy Division and Stooges Christmas and birthday discs from me, just sitting their collecting dust (ok, he liked them all for a minute and I think he still likes the Cure, but that’s where the emo-ness fits in.)

I’m kind of embarrassed on behalf of humanity actually. Thanks Eric.

*ok, not really, but I thought that was funny.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 1st, 2005 at 11:38 am and is filed under My Crazy Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.