Last night my older daughter Melissa and her long-time friend Alex showed up at my front door. Even though I knew Melissa wanted to borrow $20 from me and even though I’m broke because the car I just bought needed work already, I was happy to see them. Melissa lives in San Francisco and I don’t get to see her all the time.
“Hi Mom,” Melissa said, giving me a big hug.
“Hi, congratulations!” Alex said – he’s 29 years old, the same age as Stevie and I’ve known Alex with the dark curly hair and cute smile since he was around 14 when he and Melissa and their friends hung out. Alex and Melissa still remain best of friends after all these years, and one summer, I think it was the summer of 2007, Alex stayed at my apartment for most of the summer. We had no idea at the time that he was kicking a bad drug habit, and my place was his safe haven. Alex and I would even hang out when Melissa wasn’t around – and I got him hooked on Beatles music after a couple of trip to see the Sun Kings.
“Congratulations?” I said, forgetting for a moment.
“You know!”
“Oh yeah!” Jen, Jeremy’s girlfriend is pregnant and I’m going to be a Grandma. But were congratulations in order for me?
Yeah, I’m going to be a Grandma. I’d almost forgotten. How could I forget that? Melissa made a special trip down to hang out with Jeremy with a batch of brownies – she said they watched cartoons last night with Jeremy’s puppy Jerry acting all hyper. Melissa said she was trying to picture Jeremy as a Dad and it was hard. But she didn’t get mad about it – she said you can’t get mad over something that’s done. Stevie is mad at Jeremy and Jen because he says they aren’t ready – and because he just broke up with his girlfriend of five years (for a little while, he says) because he’s not ready. Little brother beat him to it.
As Alex and Melissa walked into the living room of the funky old house we live in and sat down on the old couches that sat in my Dad’s living room for 20 years before I inherited them, I thought about how my kids are all moving forward with their lives.
“You ever gonna get new couches?” Melissa laughed, as if she read my mind.
“Yeah, one of these days.”
One of these days, I’ll get new couches, and a brand new car – now I’m driving this old-school 1997 Honda Civic Coupe. One of these days, I’ll get a house – it’s always one of these days.
As we talked and laughed and Megan walked in with her new boyfriend Val, I took comfort in having my family around me in spite of everything going on.
“Are you in a relationship yet?” asked Alex, right out of the blue. We all laughed.
“Well, sort of – got a couple of guy friends,” I said, wondering if I ever will be truly in a “relationship.”
“Ohhh, well, you know what? If I was 50 and straight, I’d ask you out!”
Melissa and I burst out laughing – and we joked about that all night long, about how all would be well if only Alex was 50 and straight! Oh well, going it alone isn’t all bad – there’s a certain freedom that I have, although the path of going it alone can get lonely at times…
I said good-bye to Alex and Melissa spent the night, sleeping on the old couch – the same one she camped out on for a year and a half when she was only supposed to stay with me for a couple of months – the same couches we slept on when we’d visit my Dad even before Megan was born…
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You create such a lovely little scene here, such a nice moment of comfort in the midst of going it alone, in the midst of life not happening exactly as you pictured it. There's a wonderful immediacy to the writing, and to the life depicted. And a surprising joy behind it all. Really nice!
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