on energy

"Yeah, I get it Mom, it costs a lot to cool the place".
"What I am trying to tell you Erroll, is that it's opposite to our heating system, not just that it costs. The idea of heat rising, means that you close doors at the bottom of the house. Here, the cool air sits in these two upstairs rooms until you open the door, then it falls down the stairs and more has to be created in the two rooms upstairs"

The assumption that I am lecturing must come, in part, from the fact that I might actually do a little of that, and from the fact that he's a 16 yr old. I check my tone.

"Check out the two openings in the stair well. They're across from each other, and have no glass, just fixed blind slats and screen." I take him out into the top of the stairwell and show him the tall, narrow openings.

"That must be for a cross-breeze. And in the peaks of each room up here, there's a screened section too. I'll bet it's for the heat to leave. There's no insulation in this house, just the same boards inside as out."

Looking. "yup."

I know that's all I get, but from his willingness to put aside the rolling of the eyes, and the "I KNOW Mom", and from his quiet demeanor I know he's processing. Good.