Friday, November 9, 2007

The Telling of Two Lives

LWP FINAL VERSION ANTHOLOGY ENTRY
11/10/07

The Telling of Two Lives
It was impossible to say. For me, it was more impossible to hear.

* * * *

He was twenty years old in the old photo I found of him in the act of fishing. But more than a still shot, it was a picture of an artist. He held his rod in one hand, so expertly placed. The cap in his other hand, dangled in a relaxed casualness. A slight smile drew his lips into a knowing look. He seemed to know that if a fish was there, its underwater days would soon be at an end. The fish would answer this fisherman’s lure like sacrificing itself to a god.
For me it was simply a picture pulled from a box. This blip of exposure, frozen in time, was my middle child. I wanted to breathe life into this flat snapshot of someone who I thought I knew. I wanted to see the familiar. I wanted to feel the intimate essence of the spirit of the boy who stood at the edge of brackish waters and brownish green marsh grass. I wanted to touch his tawny hair, teased by a slight breeze, that played at his
hairline revealing a high, intelligent, brow. I wanted to look into the eyes I knew would not turn to me but were following the rod’s line to the surface of the water and into the
2
depths of all things true. I wanted to kiss his full lips that sealed a mouth full of a secret. I wanted to know this son, this expert fisherman.
I knew this boy standing on the bank, but in just a few years, I would not know him at all. Never would I know him as he was in this perfect photo. How cruel for this picture to hide his life…but this picture was on the surface of him, not revealing the undercurrent of who he was. This picture fooled me into thinking that this expert fisherman was my son. But this picture was a lie.
* * *
My son had been a reflective child, a day dreamer. He was quiet and somber, almost aloof. He never blasted his way through life, he just went his own way, quietly. In the same manner, he allowed me to mother him in my own way. I never once remember spanking him for anything. Redirecting and explaining things to him was enough. He seemed lost in his own world, and only held his finger like a bookmark, in places that were important to him.
All through his elementary school years his teachers had recommended him for special classes, but I fought them. He may have been disorganized and had some slight eye-hand processing problems, but he had tested above average in IQ. He was indeed special, but not in the way teachers saw him.
He never wanted to play sports, but with a little nudging from his dad and some teasing from his older brother, he had played one season of baseball when he was eight. At ten, his grandmother had given him karate lessons. We had all been so proud but also terrified at the number of times he gotten the worst of it in matches. He loved to build
3
things, first with blocks then with his dad’s tools. But most of all, too soon to be out of my sight, he would sneak away to the nearest pond to fish. And always he would come home, elated with his catch, begging me not to be angry.
As he got older, he charmed the girls and the girls charmed him. He dated many, got
seriously smitten by one, got engaged, moved out, broke it off, and moved back.
I loved him more than my life. During those sweet remembered years of boyhood I had always been prepared for scraped knees, cuts and colds, ant bites and bullies - all the things a mother can fix. But life had a terrible way of building in an un-fixedness. There was no cure, no program, no priest, or band aid that could fix my son, my precious, delicate, expert fisherman - not even my love. If only I had known.
* * *
Pictures. Like a room in my mind, I was led to the tricky place called, “memory”. I could place my hand on the cool, round knob of the door and go into the room of “him”. There I was greeted by visions of all things “him”. With eyes closed and the picture in my hand, I was free from the outside world. We were safe. The time spent there was sweet, like the taste of water after a long journey. We could meet there, cuddle, laugh and remember our lives. But I could not stay in this room. It was false. I am his mother but what I did not know then, it was not the true him.
Pictures. I was comforted by this picture of his slim figure with rod and cap in hand. I saw him there on the marshy bank of still water. Held there in time I knew him - the son of my memories, the son of my forever.
Pictures. This was a picture of a fine young man.. This picture would be a reminder of
4
my love for all things true. Like the color of his eyes, I would not have to choose to love him, it was love at first sight. The shape of love always remains - we fill it or empty it.

* * *
It was a day of awful rain and heavy traffic. I was driving my son to a friend’s house - a friend of his he wanted me to meet. My son was twenty six and had been planning to share a house with his friend. He told me I would like B-. He told me B- was about my son’s age, had a good job, and a friendly dog. I was happy to think that their plans seemed well thought out.
Secure in my thoughts, I focused on my driving. My son grew quiet. The wipers flapped back and forth, creating a splashy rhythm. The smoke from his cigarette stung my nose. I squeezed my watering eyes. How many times I had begged my sweet boy to stop smoking? He chuckled to himself, then coughed deeply, as if he knew what I had just been thinking. I reached out and touched his thin arm. He turned to face me…
I was not prepared for what would become a pivotal moment in both our lives. All I ever knew stopped and was replaced by something I could not grasp at all.
“Mother, I am gay”. His sentences poured out without periods, like the raindrops pelting my windshield - “I’ve been wanting to tell you for a long time… I just never knew how… I was afraid… For all the reasons one person is terrified that he really is another person, in the same body, I was too scared to tell you… It’s not your fault, mom… This is not about you…it is who I am…I didn’t wake up one day and decide to be gay… I didn’t choose this mom…I love you… Please mom, don’t hate me…I love you…
5
This is me, your son”.
“No!,” I screamed. “You are not gay!”
My brain revolted, stopped, jerked forward again. I couldn’t see in this heavy rain. I couldn’t form a rational thought. Noting was clear anymore. All I could do was clutch the steering wheel, keep driving and stay on the road.
This was not a conversation for a rainy day. This was not a conversation at all, it was a slap in the face. I wanted to slap him back. How dare he say such a thing to me! He had to be wrong. Had he lost his mind or had I lost mine?
“For God’s sake, you are my son. I would have known. Are you telling me you just became gay?”
If only the rain would stop. If only his words would stop. If only I could turn around and find that place in the road - that place we where we had been - to the boy I had always known - the expert fishermen, standing on the quiet, peaceful, bank of the river.
“Is this some lifestyle you are wanting to try? Who talked you into this?
Smoking was a terrible habit. Some kids must have teased or dared him into taking his first drag. He was always experimenting with the world, tweaking things this way or that. That’s it! That friend of his had gotten him to experiment with his lifestyle.
I was thinking these things, but no words came out, just racing thoughts. Had time passed? The rain, this awful rain. I do not understand anything.
“ What can I do? How can I help you out of this? What will I tell your father? Do your brother and sister know about this?
What oinment will soothe this moment? Some fever dulled my son‘s thinking.
6
Where was the cool rag for his head? I can fix this.
And what will - how will - I tell his father? I cannot say the words. My husband is a kind but stern man. He has always worked hard to pay the bills. He has no patience for foolishness. He has no reference for “gay” and “son” in the same sentence. His father does not deserve this.
Why should I tell his father? Why should I have to carry this unspeakable message? It is not my fault, it is my son’s bad news - terrible news. And still it rains.
I suddenly hear myself screaming. I cannot stop the car, I cannot stop the screams, I cannot stop the pain for either of us.
My son slumped back in his seat. He was silent. Tears rolled down his thin face. He seemed impossibly sad. Then he became breathless as he his tears turned into sobs. His long fingers gripped the handle of the door. His face turned toward the window.
My screams turned into silent sobbing. I held back my pain. I wanted to be alone. I wanted time to stop. Someone had just died - someone had left me - the son of my heart. My knuckles were white as I gripped the steering wheel. I now knew I was driving my son to his lover.
This had to be an impossibility. Had my son just left on a ‘slow boat to China’. Had I failed to be at the dock to say good-bye? What would I have said? Would I have wished him luck? Nothing about being gay seemed to be lucky. But then what did I know about being gay - nothing , absolutely nothing. Differences always make everyone else feel so normal. My son had to be right - no one would choose exclusion.
“Do you still love me?”, was his unspoken question.
7
“ Are you the boy in the picture?”, was mine.
The answer to both questions was “yes”. When we found our voices, we said so.
When the rain had stopped and we were parked in B-’s driveway, we fell into each others arms and held on for life - but it was not the life either of us would have picked.
Tolerance for me has become a “sore spot”. Would I have tried to be so tolerant of gay people if my son had not been gay? My son laughs at my awarkwardness and my ignorance. He is not careful or mindful that I am confused or hurt. He just thinks I sould not be that way. He doesn’t go around all day thinking about being gay. But every time I see my son or think about my son, I wonder what being gay really means. The burdon to know has fallen on me. That makes me angry. What my son has always felt, I have not.
As I watched my son greet his lover at the door, I felt alone and abandoned. The rain had stopped but my tears had not. My son went back into his life. I had just excited.
I drove away from my son and his lover that day. Somehow change had brought us into focus, like it or not. We could fear it, rail against it, wail and wallow in it, but we could not stop it from coming. We had choices. We could be discontent or content, adjust our expectations and adapt, or be left behind. We chose to live in the now and hold on to what is true - the love of a mother for her son and a son’s love for his mother. We would not settle.
I would be lying if I said that growing does not hurt. But the truth is, in the end - we are who we are. To be honest about who your are is the opposite of lying about who you
are not.
Pictures. I have more than a picture, I have a promise, a promise to stay in love with my son - the expert fisherman - my son, and he with me - his mother.

No comments: