Why do girls think they’re all that?

Why are parents so nosy?

Imagine your middle-aged self sitting on a panel with four other adults, trying to answer questions like these from a roomful of 13- and 14-year olds.

Tangy Roseborough planned the “teen summit” for her daughter Gwyneth’s 14th birthday. She gathered about 35 of Gwyneth’s friends at a sorority clubhouse in East Spencer for dinner, the big question-and-answer session, birthday cake and —the real draw —music and dancing.

I skipped the dancing part. I saw no reason to lose all credibility in front of the younger set.

Bad enough that I didn’t know what “trippin’ ” was.

But I learned a lot from the teens’ questions and the answers from the other members of the panel: Dr. Keith Wiggins, veterinarian; Deedee Wright, social worker with the Cabarrus County Department of Social Services; Joanna Smith, inclusion specialist at Piedmont Behavioral Healthcare; and Alisa Russell, also with Piedmont Behavioral.

I learned that all teens — not just the ones under my roof —struggle with the very same questions we did 30 years ago. How can they find themselves? Who are their true friends? What’s up with these nagging parents?

The lingo has changed, making us sound like old fogies when we harken back to our youths. But, as Joanna Smith told the teens, “Sex is still sex, drugs are still drugs ... the ghetto is still the ghetto.”

Her message to the young people: Get some skills.

I realize now that I missed my chance. After doing our best to answer the teens’ questions —under the good-natured guidance of moderator Lavetta Moore, a teacher from Salisbury High —I should have turned the tables and asked more questions of my own.

Such as, does anything we parents say make a difference?

The teens wanted to know why parents don’t listen to what they have to say. I told them we were trying, but sometimes our minds are rushing ahead to the answers we already have formed. We feel compelled to protect and teach, a compulsion that comes across as a monotonous lecture to our kids.

Even as I spoke —and even though the audience was attentive —I felt as though my words disappeared in the air before they reached the teens’ ears. I was talking in parent-speak, using words like “responsibility” and “risk.”

For peace of mind —and to keep the publishing industry flourishing —sometimes Ibuy books about such things. Recently I came across “Embracing Persephone: How To Be the Mother You Want for the Daughter You Cherish.”

You cannot imagine the fear this struck in the hearts of my daughters. Another parenting book. Hide the TV remote control!

But on to Persephone. In Greek mythology, Persephone is a beautiful, teen-age maiden who’s out picking flowers one day when the earth opens up. Hades, god of the underworld, snatches her up and carries her off to you-know-where — every mother’s nightmare.

Hades fixes it so Persephone can never return home for good. But, as author Virginia Beane Rutter explains, “Each spring she comes back to her mother, Demeter, goddess of grain and plenty, who ecstatically embraces her and brings the world back to life.” Hence we have spring, the Greeks believed.

The conclusion for us mothers?Rutter suggests that we embrace and guide our daughters when we can, and accept the fact that we cannot control everything they think and do. “Your understanding will insure that she will not feel so stifled, insecure, or unloved that she has to find relief or seek love and attention by acting out in self-destructive ways.”

I guess this means no trippin’.

My daughters tried to fill me in on what that means. We’re trippin’ when we get into their business, lay down the law, get on our soapbox about what’s wrong with young people today. (Gwyneth, please correct me if this is wrong.)

We’ll never stop being nosy, though. As DeeDee pointed out, look at the Columbine murderers and you’ll see parents who should have snooped around their kids more.

We need more teen summits like the one Tangy put together. Advice sinks in deeper when it comes from someone other than your own mother or father. Keith, Deedee, Joanna, Alisa and I had the teens’ complete attention.

And it doesn’t hurt for parents to hear the fundamental doubts that teens struggle with —doubts that we detect at home but don’t always hear articulated. For today’s teens, growing up seems faster. Racier. Sexier. But nothing has made it easier, and the pain is still there.

I’m looking forward to spring.

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