The Last Time I Ever Admitted to Agreeing With My Almost Teenager
Bennett: Mom, listen to this quote from my book, “There are 80 billion stars in the universe and 300 billion planets and if one in a million has the capability to support life and one in a million of those have life and one in a million of those have intelligent life, then there are 1.5 million civilizations out there.”*
Me: Yep, see that’s why I always say aliens must exist.
Bennett: Stop it.
Me: Stop what?
Bennett: You’re mocking me. You always mock me.
Me: …I’m actually not mocking you. I’m serious.
Bennett: You’re making fun of me.
Me: Uh, I’m not making fun of you, but whatever. This is an annoying conversation.
Bennett: You really think there’s probably aliens out there?
Me: I do. It just makes logical sense to me. I feel like it’s probably not really likely that we’ll have contact with intelligent extra-terrestrial life any time soon, but they’ve found that even the very nearest planet to us may have supported life at some point, so with the vastness of the universe it really only makes sense that intelligent life is out there.
Bennett: REALLY? I just… say stuff like that all the time to my friends and they only make fun of me… I thought you were making fun of me too. I can’t believe you agree with me!
Me: Well… I mean I am your mother, so it kind of makes sense that we might have some of the same opinions about things, don’t you think?
Bennett: I guess so. So I’ve been thinking about all of this and – {Cue 20 minute long rambling dissertation on his opinions about space, dimensions, alien life and consciousness that he’s built out of 7 or so years of reading science fiction and fantasy novels, during which I cannot even understand most of what he’s talking about much less get a word in edgewise.}
Me: Nevermind. I don’t really believe in aliens. I was mocking you.
Bennett: I KNEW IT.
*When I asked Ben if he could find the quote from the book he was reading the other day when we had that conversation he was like, “I have it memorized” and rattled it off while I typed it out. And yet he was getting a D in Social Studies like a month ago because he couldn’t be bothered to remember the facts behind The Civil War. I know this is probably somehow my fault.