The sound of his truck coming up the driveway woke me, and
then his dog was in my room, all whipping tail and twirling with muscular
excitement. I’d left the door to the front garden open and had fallen asleep
reading.
My son was in a dark mood and unusually humorless. The hood
of his truck was open, the battery wasn’t holding a charge, the alternator
perhaps, he was meant to meet friends in Oregon and go backpacking. He usually lets me know when he is going to
stop by and I was surprised he was taking time off work, having only started
his job two months prior.
There was more to this story. I asked about the house I’d recently leased
for him and his brother, who was in summer school. I asked about work, and the progress I hoped
he’d made with registering for classes at the community college. He said he was on a wait list for the intro
welding class. This was the condition for which I would pay for his rent, if he
were in school full time. He’d given his
brother his word that he was committed.
The next morning over coffee I pulled the more truthful
threads out of him: He’d quit his job.
He hated Santa Cruz. Boring, doesn’t
make enough money at the berry farm to fix what needs fixing on his truck,
commuting is ruining his truck, needs to fix the headlight and the
suspension. After he left I found a discarded pot
dispensary receipt for two quarter ounces equaling $100 on the floor with a cliff bar wrapper. The college campus felt like an institution,
he didn’t like being there. He wants to be in nature. He’s going back to Humbolt
to work on another farm with a friend.
I learn in this same conversation that his brother got 100%
on his midterms. I should have been leaning
into this great news, celebrating the focus and dedication of his accomplishments and not dwelling on
my disappointment and concern for his older brother. But I am so very disappointed; I could barely
sleep the night before and I remembered him at preschool drop off, hurling himself against the closed door, screaming for me. I sat on a bench outside the classroom and cried. A year later his younger brother barely
looked over his shoulder when I left, totally engrossed in the Brio track he
was assembling. They could not be more
different.
I always feel an empty hole in my chest when I think of my
son, an equal mixture of love and concern. I asked him if he wanted to see a
therapist, as he seemed so depressed. He
scoffed, mocking me, insulted. I
reprimanded him for being rude. I want to help, but he wanted only for this conversation to end and his
truck to start. He hugged me and he left.
