'Want me to shut up? OK': Condescending parents embarrassed after snubbing a highly-logical teenager on a long-distance road trip

Author image for Jesse Kessenheimer
Jesse Kessenheimer • Writer and Editor
Mar 7, 2024 6:00 PM EST

Parents have a nasty habit of underestimating their kids. Perhaps this is because they cleaned our diapers and taught us not to eat the glitter glue, but once we were grown into teenagers, we had more of the world figured out than they imagined. In this next story, a highly logical teenager gets pushed to the side when some vacation hiccups turn into substantial problems. 

A pair of parents taking their son and his best friend on a road trip to the southwest encountered a bit of a situation. After driving for 9 hours on the first day of their trip, they noticed the latch of their old 1988 Town Car was getting stuck when they popped the latch with the button up front. Frustrated and unable to get their luggage out of the car, the parents went into panic mode but were quick to sideline the suggestions of the eager teens in the backseat. 

Scroll for the entire story of how this teenager had a satisfying 'I told you so' moment after getting told to shut his mouth. After this, here's another story of a couple of parents who took advantage of their Gen X kiddos after spending their life savings. 

Advertisement
  • 01
    Me: "Dad, why don't you..." Dad: "Quiet! I'm trying to think here!"
    via canva
  • 02
    Posted by u/P4ddyC4ke 3 Want Me to Shut Up? OK, Argue about it till you give up. Then I'll fix it. M OC
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 03
    This is from the summer between Freshman and Sophomore year, circa 1989 about 15yo. This is my best recollection of events. One of my best friends was going on summer vacation with his mom and dad (only child) and they let him invite a friend to go with him so he wasn't alone. They were headed to
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 04
    see the grand canyon with the final destination being Las Vegas. We were driving from South Louisiana. We were riding in a Lincoln Town Car for the trip, circa 1988. Similar Pic AD
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 05
    This car had the type of trunk where you'd close the trunk and it would latch about 2" above the deck and then a motor would pull it down the rest of the way tightly closing it. They would open it by hitting the trunk release which was a button in the glove box.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 06
    This friends parents were known to argue. We'll call them Mr. Friend's Dad (MFD) and Mrs. Friend's Mom (MFM). They would get into shouting matches just about anything. My friend had learned to just be quiet when this happened, but I didn't have to do that with my parents so I wasn't used to that.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 07
    They had planned to stay at little hotels on the way and we were probably somewhere in Texas the first night, when we arrived in the evening at our hotel. They popped the trunk by hitting the release in the glove box and we got out to start getting our bags to take them inside,
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 08
    but when they tried to lift the trunk lid, it was still latched. My friends dad tried hitting the release button again. He tried pushing the trunk closed again to start over, but the motor wasn't taking it down. He tried looking under the trunk lid in the 2" gap to see if he could loosen the latch manually.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 09
    Meanwhile, I had an idea I thought could fix the problem. I kept trying to say my idea while he was checking all of his fixes. Me: "MFD, why don't..." MFD: "Quiet! I'm trying to think here!"
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 10
    After he tried a couple of things, the arguing started between Mom and Dad. They argued about, "What are we going to do? We can't get our luggage. Do we get something to break it open? But then we can't keep it closed to travel. Should we call a tow truck?" etc...
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 11
    I tried to give my solution and was shut down every time, ending eventually with a, MFD & MFM "Shut up! Y'all go sit in the car." So, we did.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 12
    A few minutes later they came and got in the car and told us, "we're going to have to cancel the trip and just drive home through the night." As it got quiet and I finally felt like I could talk, I said, "Why don't you just use the key?"
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 13
    There was a notable pause as the idea started to sink in. "Oh my goodness... that's so smart!" MFM said as they both hopped out trying the key. The trunk opened right up.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 14
    They came back in the car after a couple minutes and apologized to me for yelling and told us we can get our bags and keep going on the trip. For the rest of the trip, the motor part of the trunk didn't work to pull it
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 15
    all the way closed, but we were, though able to continue. The trunk would latch and hold 2" above being completely closed and the key worked to open it. We just hoped there wouldn't be any rain in the desert.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 16
    We got to hike into the grand canyon for about an hour down which took 2 hours to come back up and got far enough we could barely see the Colorado River in a space between two crevices. We drove over the Hoover Dam and in Las Vegas. We
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 17
    stayed at Circus Circus which at the time had a kids section full of arcade games and other attractions. Every time MFD or MFM would win at the slots they'd give us more money to spend. :) All in all it was a fun trip.
    via P4ddyC4ke
  • 18
    sovamind 1 hr. ago Glad that you weren't fully compliant and eventually shared the key tip for them and got to continue the trip.
    via sovamind
  • 19
    CoderJoel 1 hr. ago Cancelling the trip by spending the entire night driving home seems a bit excessive. How can people cave in to minor hardships so easily?
    via CoderJoe1
  • 20
    prankerjoker 1 hr. ago There was a notable pause as the idea started to sink in. That's the key moment to saving the trip.
    via prankerjoker
  • 21
    iamjustacrayon . 13 min. ago I'm impressed that they apologized to you (It's sad how unexpected I found that...)
    via iamjustacrayon

Want More? Follow Us and Add Us as a Preferred Source on Google.

Tags

deserved latch embarassed trunk kids condescending key sidelined story family reddit thread Reddit road trip vacation
Scroll Down For The Next Article