buoyed by life with boys

Light. Lighter. Even though we drove the final miles in a downpour, the loads began to lighten on arrival. I had thought the story would begin here, but somehow this was the finale, or maybe the epilogue.

First, Waiting

I live these days with three boys. That’s not a complaint. They are, really, each of them, men, with things to do and places to be, and it’s good that I now have places to be more days a week than I used to, because, otherwise, I would wait around a lot for them.

One day last week, I waited for the boy who has been my man for many days of dark and light and crazy thrills and ordinariness. Looking back, I wonder how far would stretch, laid end to end (if such were possible), the amount of minutes I’ve spent waiting for him. Across the continent, the breadth of the sea?

But things have to be repaired. Gadgets don’t say to him, “Oh, so much time spent on me already! You go on home to the missus, I can get along till Monday.” A completely predictable thing in our existence together is his always on-call status that threatens my best laid plans.

I hopped and skipped through packing that day, even dragging my own overnight bag from the attic and avoiding bonking my head on a beam. Singing, smiling, I washed up dishes, changed the cat’s water. Figured the latest hour it might possibly be until he rode up on his bicycle. And then, he was there, in the truck in the driveway. Hours early. Hooray!

Oh, wait. He had the company truck. Meaning he wasn’t done for the day. Not by a long shot; merely heading up to Blanton Heights to get started. “I’ll be lucky if we finish by tomorrow.”

Boys of Neighborhoods Past

I remember bounding out the door with my two littler brothers, ready for games in the neighborhood. We always had boys to play with, or maybe it was most girls stayed indoors and dressed up their cats or something. I wanted to lead the army, conduct the band, write the script for all the kids screaming our terrible eagle cries as we wheeled and swooped over deep canyons.

I expected them to follow me, my imaginings. And bless their hearts, some fine evenings they did. They believed my theory that certain rocks were really aliens (their leader living on the moon: “If you squint just right, you can see him up there, look!”).

But most days, it pretty quickly became difficult. The boy over here thought eagles were stupid; the one who lived two blocks away said we had to fly to the ocean and kill seagulls and then drown ourselves. Soon we all fell back on standards like frozen tag and “I double dare ya!”

And yet, next chance after school, I was out there again releasing the magic in my thoughts for them for as long as they could glimpse it.

More Flurry, Less Fury

For marriage, at the wise old age of 19, I formed a plan:
Squelch the magic, do everything this boy’s way. Then I will always be secure. He will always love me.

I couldn’t imagine, 20-some years later, hearing, “I still love you, but I don’t always like you anymore.”

Only one of many fractured fairy tale moments, sure, but it stands out for me still. Because the moments started teaching me to listen, to take note.

He needed me to share my differentness. This boy, like others I had known, wanted a glimpse of how I see reality. Of what makes me tick. I was supposed to try and orchestrate eagles in the yard for him, too. And live with the resulting conflict, instead of exploding in frustration every other day. And make compromises. Risk waiting, risk letting things go.

Seaing is Belief

The gadgets up on Blanton finally released him last week. I figured a plan to pick him up at the station on the way out of town, leaving his bike to be wheeled home when we returned. Which was all good, because we made it to the Arch Rock Inn, as the clouds burst, a few minutes before their office closed. And we found our room with sherry in a decanter and the surf pounding out the window as the last light faded.

And the rest of our epilogue tasted sweet as a story.