Every now and then it happens

Tonight I heard those words so sweet for a parent to hear from a teen: "Mom, you were right." My 14-year-old daughter was determined to watch the movie "Speed" on TV, despite the fact that it was rated R. She'd watched about half of it a few nights ago before I realized what the rating was, and wanted to watch the whole thing when it was repeated tonight. Now, it was on a basic cable station with commercials, so I was pretty sure they'd have to take all the hard R stuff out; and she swore nothing about it had bothered her during the previous viewing. But I also remembered that there were scary parts of that movie that just involved Dennis Hopper being one creepy dude; and remembered, too, that there have been other things on TV that didn't bother her right up until the point where they bothered her very, very much. So fuddy-duddy Mom was against the repeat viewing, and at the very least insisted that Dad be in the room watching with her (not Mom, you'll notice; things bother me, too.) So she watched the whole thing, and when I asked her how she liked it, she uttered those entirely gratifying words. And now, of course, I'll have to worry about whether I'm making her fearful by being afraid for her, and whether she was spooked by the movie this time because I was so sure she would be. But not tonight. Tonight, I'm just going to do the "you were right" dance and enjoy delightful vindication.