I remember telling Laurea, when Kina was very small and demanded we never leave her alone in her room, that eventually she would absolutely insist on being left alone in her room and make a real point of slamming the door to separate herself from us when she was feeling extra spicy about our parenting skills. We figured, like naive first-time parents, that we had at least until middle school before the first door was slammed in our house, but reader, we were wrong.

The teens come at you quickly. Sometimes in just five years.

dad