Child of the Wild Wind

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Joshua Weil is torn when his mom goes off to medical school and his dad takes him to live in a rural commune. The up-side is that he gains more control over his own life through home-schooling. Plus, his father and other members of the commune treat him with the same respect they treat adults. At thirteen, Josh can consider himself a man.
     However, the older girl he's in love with sees him only as a bright—but short—boy who helps her with homework. The challenges he faces during his first year as a teen do make a man of him, but not in the way he expects.

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from Chapter 2:

    While we were carrying our bags down the path, I found out this was going to be a whole other world from everything I'd been used to. As we came to one building that our map said was a residence hall named Tranquility, a woman in jeans and a bulky sweater came outside, pulled down her jeans and squatted beside a tree about ten yards from us.

"I guess what Rosencrantz said about peeing on trees meant women as well as men," Dad whispered to me after we'd passed her. I was too embarrassed to say anything, but I took a quick peek back before the woman was out of sight. A whole other world!

Visitor Bunk had a men's side and a women's side, but we were the only visitors this month. It looked like a cowboy bunkhouse in the old movies, four bunk beds and not much else in the room. Someone had made up two lower bunks for us with sheets and blankets and pillows. The other bunks had bare mattresses, the hard cotton kind without inner springs. I checked under the sheets and ours were the same.

"Not exactly a luxury hotel, Josh. But we're tough, right?" He always said that when we were camping out or something. Then we'd sing the chorus of "Ride, Tenderfoot, Ride" from an old Gene Autry record he'd bought at a flea market. It felt good to have one thing stay the same, even if it was corny.

When we'd finished our cowboy song, he looked at his watch. "Let's go to the dining hall . . . Sun Power," he was studying the map again. "Should be about time for dinner. Do you need to use a tree first?" We both laughed.