Meeting your kid's date.

Good morning and happy holidays. This is the time of year when many of us meet our kids' special someones for the first time. I thought I'd share our heartwarming (gutwrenching) meeting with our daughter's boyfriend. It's kind of a long story, but hang in there. Once you get through the gut wrenching part, there's an HEA:

My daughter’s boyfriend, Matt, is definitely an acquired taste. And through my darling only child, Holly, we managed to acquire him. It all began the summer she worked in a video store. This wasn’t one of those dream jobs for a college student between semesters, but she probably remembers it fondly since she made more friendships than money.

Most of the employees had a love of music in common. By the end of the summer, I was hearing about a couple of young guys working at the store who played in a local rock band. She and some of her friends from the store went to see them play a few times. Before long, Holly was dating one of them. He even took her to a party at Sully’s house (of Godsmack fame.) She was gobsmacked.

We didn’t need to approve of Holly’s dates anymore, but they had been seeing each other for a few months, and I asked her to bring him by some time. She said he was “afraid” to meet us. Afraid? Of us? But we’re cool parents! Okay, slightly overprotective parents trying to be cool, but it’s almost the same thing. Why should he be afraid to meet us?

I came home from work one evening to find one huge pair of shoes in the living room. They weren’t my husband’s, and I didn’t know any clowns, so to whom did they belong? Soon, my daughter bounded downstairs to make a snack for herself and Matt. So, the mystery boyfriend was upstairs! When my husband got home the two of us camped out on the couch, waiting to meet this legendary boyfriend. It was kind of like waiting to see if Bigfoot existed. I might have been less surprised if Bigfoot had actually descended the stairs instead of Matt.

Large stocking feet came into view, then huge pants that fell below his underwear as if they were many sizes too big—which they were. At last, we saw his face. Rather, once we recovered from the shock of seeing the bright green hair and about twenty piercings on either side, then we saw his face. He would have been handsome. Such a pity.

We tried not to overreact. Maybe the band would hit it big and he’d go on tour? Nope. The band broke up and he played video games in his mother’s basement for a year. Maybe he’d decide to “find himself” and go to Tibet or something. No, he was perfectly satisfied being a slacker, thank you.

This one boy turned my husband from stepfather to full-fledged parent. The more he made it clear that he didn’t like this kid, the more my daughter defended him. And then we learned that Matt had been kicked out of high school and had never graduated. That was it. My husband declared war! The hostilities were short-lived, thank God. My daughter wisely waited to mention this until Matt was ready to take his GED--which he passed with flying colors. Oh, and he gave up the bright colors in his hair, letting his beautiful, thick brown waves show. Next, he took his SAT’s. That’s when we discovered how smart this kid was. Sheesh! Who knew?

Matt is now in his Junior year of college, keeping a 4.0 average. We’re delighted (and relieved) to say that in the past five years, my daughter’s boyfriend has grown on us. He’s good-looking, smart, honest, and funny—and he loves my daughter as much as we do. Why’d we worry?