Raising Children

I have a refrigerator magnet that a friend gave me that says, 'Raising children is like being pecked to death by chickens'.  I might add, by chickens with dull beaks. This is especially true when our children reach deep into their teenage years and early 20s.  They seem to get the idea that if they persist long enough and ask the same question with different phraseology that the answer will change.  For example, our daughter Chelsea has been asking -- in various ways for about 3 years now -- if she can get a tattoo.  Can someone tell me what the great fascination is with body ink?  I've seen too many 60-somethings with faded, saggy body art (to go along with their body parts!) to say yes.  To be honest, I know that I am fortunate that she even bothers to ask.  She is, after all, nearly 21.  She recognizes, however, that even though she is *of age* -- she is also living under her parents' roof (rent free) and that we feed her and provide her with internet access and a cell phone.  More proof that there is no free lunch. Anyway, back to the tattoo.  I know I should let her make her own mistakes -- let her do the stupid things we all did (disco, white lipstick, tube tops).  But the difference is white lipstick wipes off, tube tops become dust rags and disco....well -- there are no videos, thankfully, of me on a checkerboard-lit dance floor.  A tattoo is permanent.  There is no painless way to remove it when you get tired of it. And if you get it where no one else can see it, why bother?  So far, I've convinced her that the human brain doesn't fully "ripen" until the age of 23.  I read somewhere that up to that age, our decision making abilities are still rather primitive. She'll be 21 in January of 2013......I have 2.5 more years to come up with another excuse.