Gone…
I do not know what to do with the tears of a child who is a man, who is a child.
“They are graduating.” This was the response after an hour of difficulty getting Jason up this morning for school.
“One week left.” Wasn’t met with the same enthusiasm it usually is when we approach the end of the year. His summer is filled with enough structure to allow Jason to remain busy and watched, yet enough free time to wander his community. It is well thought out with room for spontaneity.
This end of the year is different.
“I won’t see my friends again, they are graduating.” Tears continue to flow, hugs follow.
“You will see them again,” I say, lying, “they’ll still be in town.” But I know they will rarely if ever see each other again. His classmates are off into their own world. A uniquely structured existence that allows their families to function and remain a family.
Jason will not graduate, if you can call it that, until he is twenty-one, this is planned. He is familiar with the safe social composition of school. Keeping him there to max out what he might have left in maturity is not only necessary but crucial. He needs all he can get before the world throws him into a pretend adult existence of changing programs with mobile funding. He will have to fold himself into a world where people he attaches to disappear.
I am exploring the idea of an existence where those you grab onto fade away. The playing field keeps losing players and the landscape re shapes itself to fit the flavor of the day, week, year…years. I shoo away the pressure of being his one and only, comforted by the fact that he can be distracted with a kind gesture and the company of anyone who will play with him. I want to understand his thoughts, but I can only feel his emotions and watch his behavior. I can guess, but from one minute to the next it changes. This is both a challenge and a salvation. His inability to hold onto a specific desire allows him to move through his life without lingering emotional pain…. look, something shiny. But through the ups and downs of his changing daily life, his family remains the same. Who will distract him when I am gone.
Gone…
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