During his once-a-month-and-for-all-he-knows-last call from his sole surviving parent having had his phone wrestled from his hand by some totalitarian thug...
You got that right. But the flip side of this is that a mother was disconnected from talking to her 17 year old son. A son who she presumeably hasn't seen for 4 going on 5 months. A son whose father is dead. A son who is new to the high school, new to the town--a son who attends public school. I worry about my 17 year old son, who I see every day, when he's across town in the public high school, when he's driving, when he's at work, when he's any place other than asleep in his bed. I'm not an obsessive worry-wort, but I like & need the reassurance that he is O.K....and I'm here to tell you that a once-a-month phone call isn't a 'luxury' from her POV. It's a freaking necessity and if these 'administrators' are a little bent out over the kid using a little profanity, just wait til momma gets home. Gutless wonders thought they could get away with the tough guy act since the kid doesn't have a parent around the block and in his corner. I dearly hope that travel arrangements have been made for Mom & that a contingent of brass accompanies her to have a little 'This is how the cow ate the cabbage' discussion with the petty tyrants at Spencer High School. That, and a Million Mom March headed in that direction.
You two seem to have been watching too many soap operas.
I can add more to that. No soldier in a combat zone needs to be hit with a major unresolvable family crisis back home that they cannot address, resolve, or even understand. Each soldier in the combat zone has a single duty to themselves ever hour of every day. They must maintain the highest state of readiness against all possible hostile threats because the lives of their soldiers and their own lives are dependent on that vigilance. This incredibly inept action on the part of the school administration has now given the mother just the kind of an unresolvable domestic issue that can drive a deployed parent crazy with worry. Studies show that in a combat situation a distracted soldier is less likely to respond in a timely manner to a perceived threat, and is thus far more likely to be seriously wounded or killed.
And to top it off, it is Mother's Day weekend and god forbid if something happens to his mom, it could have been his last chance to speak to her.
A son whose mother voluntarily took a job that took her halfway around the world from him, and into a war zone.
It used to be that if you were in the military and your kid acted up at school, the brass had a bit of a sit-down with you.