May 28, 2001, Fort Meyer, Colorado: Katie Crane’s mother, Jody, has gone from being the “cool mom everybody liked” to a general nuisance on the verge of repelling visitors, Katie’s friends reported yesterday.

“Jody has always been the mom we could talk to,” Jennifer Hewes, 17, said as she ate a veggie sandwhich at the Fort Meyer Mall’s Kwick Kitchen. Hewes, who has been friends with Katie since grade school, recounted happier times in their friendship. “Jody would always let us watch scary movies when we were little, before the other parents would. She didn’t care if there was cussing in the movie or not, either.” She also fondly recalled when Jody taught the girls how to play “Spin the Bottle” in 7th grade, and helped them pierce their ears in 9th.

Kelly Cox and Courtney Burkitch, ages 16 and 17 respectively and both friends of Katie as well, both shared similar stories. “I live with my dad and don’t have any sisters, so when I got my period, there was no one I could talk to. Katie told her mother about it, and Jody was all, ‘oh come here girl,’ and answered all my questions. I don’t know what I would have done without her,” Courtney recalled.

“And, like, last month, when I thought I might be pregnant,” Kelly added, her voice raising in intonation, as if each clause or statement were a question, “she was so cool, you know. She took me to get on of those, like, pregnancy tests and talked to me and everything.” She looked very serious for a moment, her voice lowering, and added, “I could have NEVER done that with my mother. She would KILL me if she knew I was having sex.” Smiling sheepishly, she shrugged her shoulders and added, “the test was negative, thank God.”

After a moment of pensive silence between the three of them, Jennifer continued. “Now Katie’s mom is getting TOO personal, and it’s really starting to creep me out,” she said, leaning over to sip her Diet Mountain Dew.

“I know,” Courtney agreed. “That story she told last night was just WAY too much information.”

“She’s been hanging around us a lot lately,” Jennifer explained, “and that was, like, okay at first. But then it got kind of annoying. So then last night, we were, like, talking about our boyfriends, and Jody comes in and is all, ‘you girls make sure you get yours too, you know what I mean.’ She was all, ‘don’t you girls be with a guy who just does his thing and doesn’t care if you have an orgasm or not.’”

“I mean, it was cool and all that she’s into, you know, empowering us or whatever,” Courtney added. “You know, self esteem and all that is good for girls our age to hear, and I know what she’s saying, cause I know girls who...well...GIVE but never receive, if you know what I mean,” here, the teenager smiled nervously and shrugged slightly before continuing, “but it was just, like, way too weird when she started talking about the clitoris and everything.”

“Yeah, I just don’t need to hear that from a mother, even Jody,” Jennifer agreed. Kelly nodded rigorously. Last night’s uncomfortable situation seems to indicate a recent trend with Ms. Crane.

“I know,” Jennifer agreed. “I mean, last week when Jody was all, ‘oh girls, we’ve got to go try that new club out some time soon,’ I was like, ‘um...that’s okay. You’re cool and all, but I don’t really want to go to Whispers with a thirty-five-year-old’. I mean, I didn’t say that, but that’s what I was thinking, you know.”

Whispers, a nightclub for teens that does not serve alcohol, is one of the girls’ favorite hangouts, and they all agreed that having Jody there would be strange, but they expressed concern over how saying so might affect their friendship with Katie. “It was like, should we tell her it’s not cool for her mom to come, or what, you know?” Kelly asked/explained.

Now, after last night’s disturbing episode of openness, the girls are even more apprehensive about the future. “I just don’t know if I want to hang out over there any more,” Kelly admitted.

“I know. It’s like, my dad has that stupid V-chip, and we can’t talk about boys or anything cool when he’s home, but I’m thinking we might just have to start hanging out at my house,” Courtney conceded.

“Yeah,” Kelly agreed, “at least we know your dad won’t, like, come out and start drawing us a diagram of the vagina or something.”