practice

I did it today. I have been getting my hair cut for almost two years now by a sweet lady a couple of Vermont villages from me. You know what’s funny? We were talking about our children’s births, as folks tend to do, and she finally heard that I had had two. After two years of getting my hair cut, hearing about her dogs — some of whom have died and I have cried with her and looked at their pictures, her husband, her kids, her father being financially abused as an elderly man “who wants to help people,’ — all of this I had once in awhile let slip that I had two sons, and today she heard me when I told her the birth weights of them both. 8.6 and 10.7, in case you’re curious. And she did it. She said, “I know you live near your son with the grandchildren, where is your other son?”

And I had to answer. It’s not like I didn’t know that it would come up if I was so careless as to drop hints, or so needy as to drop hints, or so curious as to drop hints — to see what would happen.

“We lost him,” I said. No more, no less. I did feel like I might cry, but I didn’t because she just said she was sorry and very concertedly changed the subject. We don’t know each other well enough for her to ask more.

How did I feel about it? I feel like if I skirt it all together and tell people that I just have one son that I have betrayed him. I feel like if I can tell anyone about him and not lose my shit that I have betrayed him. Which is harder, which takes more of a psychic toll? I know for a fact he wouldn’t care at all — that he would love me for worrying about this. I feel like he must have always felt like he had to either be super- acknowleged or quietly diminished by omission even as he struggled.

I think I have to make a decision as to how to proceed. I think it’s best to leave it quiet for now. The bags of needles are still on top of the shelf, the blue bin of shoes and boots to donate are still on the living room floor. I have decided. This can wait too.