MiniShambles Explodes: The Teen in the Mix

I spent the first half of Thursday last week frantically jumping between phone and computer, trying to keep my head on as MS and I tried to rein in our daughter like a rogue missile in movie climax. She was ballistic.

Little background please?

Of course. A couple months ago MiniShambles had the luck (read: poor judgement) of catching two speeding tickets within forty minutes. A couple weeks ago, her license was suspended by a not-very impressed magistrate for 90 days, giving her only home(s) and work privileges.

But MiniShambles didn't think the law was suited to her proclivities, and within 24 hours was playing fast and loose with running out to Starbucks or stopping by her friend's house or picking up her boyfriend before work. It didn't take us long to catch wind of this and we nailed it down quickly; having already had to eat the ticket, we were not looking forward to another infraction, which would inevitably kill her license and her job - and with it any chance of getting paid back.

But on the horizon, we saw trouble. MiniShambles was dropping hints of a planned trip four hours away to Cedar Point. How was she going to get there? Her friend would drive her car. Yeah, NO. Okay, her friend would drive. Really? Okay.

And then the night before the road trip happened and MiniShambles's friend went to the house to sleep over so they could leave in the morning and MS brought up friend's driving. What? She couldn't drive - her parents would kill her. So MS and Mini went at it via text until 2am ending with the mantra "HELL NO."

MS woke up the next morning and when she looked outside, her jaw dropped: Mini and friend had awakened early, quietly left the house, moved MS's car, and drove away north.

Here's where we become NORAD and call and text and Mini won't answer for a couple hours but I've got her pinged on the Family Locator phone program, so we know exactly where she is and MS finally gets her on the phone and Mini distills it down to "I don't care - do whatever you want when I get home!" But that's not going to fly; we're way past that. So MS says "Dad's going to ping you in 15 minutes. If you are not back on the highway coming south at that point, we will call the police and the next person you speak with will be a State Trooper.

She turned around, and a couple hours later, she was home. We took the car away for at least a month. And now it's up to her to find a way to work This coming Tuesday - and I don't know if she'll make it.

We know she's pushing. Things are in turmoil right now. Things are chaotic, in flux, and if MiniShambles can farm out a little more territory in this split, she's going to take advantage of it. It's a new room and she's testing the doors, windows, every crack she can.

But we never saw it going as far as "stealing" the car. It messed us up for a few days, scared the hell out of us, then made us angry.

And the thing that makes me livid is that we made the decision to help Mini keep her job. She works some 5 days a week and we said we'd pick her up every shift, but she would have to work with us and figure out a way to work. She can pick up the bus and with one transfer be up at King's Island. But no, she won't ride the bus. It's gross and icky and she might get a staph infection. This young woman who has never ridden the bus is playing Posh Veruca about how shitty that bus is and is literally willing to lose her job over not taking the bus.

I swear we raised her better than that.

Really.