My son, Tom

I am still adjusting to my new life as Working Mum/Wife/Famous-Author-To-Be/Blogger Extraordinaire and so my apologies for not writing a new blog in over a week. I'm finding there are not enough hours in the day (this from someone who used to stay up all night and party *sigh*).

My son turned 15 last week and, as I drove to work, I was reflecting on the massive change in him since we moved to live in California. He always had the potential to be a sweetheart, but would successfully camoflage this delightful personality trait under screaming tantrums and extremely stubborn behaviour. He detested school and would sometimes show his displeasure by refusing to get dressed. Once I drove him to school in his PJs (and let me tell you, the UK is very strict about its school uniform). Since then, with a lot of alternative therapy work, growing older, and a strong male role model in my new hubby, he has transformed into the sweetest, kindest, hard-working, respectful, polite, most responsible, if slightly nerdy, boy you could ever wish to meet. He even mentioned in the car to me the other day how much he was enjoying school. I nearly drove off the road into one of those stupid stop signs.

I offered him some options for his birthday party: paintballing, movies, bowling, anything, whatever he wanted, provided it happened somewhere else. But no, he chose to have his friends round to our house to watch a movie. Although I appreciated the economy of his decision, the thought of having eight over-grown, hormonal 15 year olds charging round my house like a herd of unwashed elephants was not a pleasant one. The potential body odor issue alone was terrifying.

He is now taller than me and is desperately trying to grow facial hair. Sadly, what he is growing on his upper lip is still the bum-fluff variety and merely looks like he hasn't washed properly (which, more often than not, is probably the case). We also had an open and frank conversation about sex. We'd had one a few years ago but it seems he needed a refresher. With any other teenage boy I would wonder where this was leading, but he assured me he does not want to have any sort of sexual relations until he is much older and in a long-term relationship, maybe even not before he gets married. (Where did he come from, I wonder? Perhaps he really is an alien dropped from another planet, as he used to insist when a toddler.)

At this moment he is filming some weird and wonderful new video with his two best friends. He is a very talented film and video student at High School (where they have the most amazing brand new TV and video editing facilities due to some grant from somewhere) and I am praying that, one day, hopefully not too far away, he will be able to keep me in the manner to which I would dearly love to become accustomed. Maybe he could even help out on the film of my best-selling book ... now there's a thought :)