Mary FortuneMy son, 15 years old and all angles, wandered out onto the screened porch and plopped down on a chair. I was curled up on the couch, flipping through a magazine. Ceiling fan spinning slowly above me. Dog napping at my feet. Trees whispering their spring secrets to each other.
“Why are we so lucky?” my man/boy asked in his disconcertingly deep voice.
I looked up from my reading. “I wonder that all the time,” I told him. “I think about it every day. But I don’t know the answer.”
I don’t know the answer, but I’m glad he has the presence of mind to ponder the question, that he recognizes the sublime, impermanent gifts we drift through our days taking as givens. The challenge of teaching gratitude is largely a challenge of logic. We all know we’re lucky. We’re here together, and mostly healthy, and we have more than we need to be comfortable and safe and to focus on luxuries like education and chats on the screened porch.
We’re inexpressibly fortunate. But because I can’t explain why, and I can’t predict whether or when our luck might run out, I can’t entirely satisfy my sons’ questions as they try to puzzle out the world. All I know to tell them is to give away their luck to people who might need some of the extra we inexplicably got handed. What else is there?
“I’m worried about Rat Patrol,” my younger son, who’s 10, told me recently. He’s my worrier. (I worry about that.)
“Why are you worried?” I asked. “Does she seem sick?”
“She’s 18, Mom. That’s like 125 in cat years. I’m worried she’s going to die.”
I pondered that for a minute. “Sweetie, she’s definitely going to die one day, and we’re all going to be extremely sad,” I said. “But that just means we should be sure to give her lots of love now. We should love her now because we won’t always have her.”
“She’s such a good cat,” he sighed.
“She is,” I agreed. “Best cat ever. And she has a good, happy life, and she’s here with us now. So instead of worrying she’s going to die, you should go give her a hug. You’re missing what’s good now because you’re worried about what might be bad later. That’s no fun, is it?”
He can’t help it, though. I get it. In the overwhelming whirl of my everyday, I sometimes force myself stop and consider that I will look back on these years from some distant, unknown someday and see nothing but wonderful. Beautiful boys and an incredible career and a sweet husband and my mama just a mile away. I even have my creaky old cat and my silly little dog and what is there to want? Nothing. There’s nothing to want.
I’m late a lot. Actually, I missed the deadline to get this column into last Sunday’s paper. I wish I could get a handle on it, but I struggle with the space/time continuum. It’s always confounded me — the inexorable, vicious pull of linear time, the infuriating limitations of physical space and distance. How it’s always now, but never for very long.
Why are we so lucky? How long will it last? What will happen next?
I don’t know, my boys. But if there’s a time and place we’ll learn those answers, I hope we get to take our sweet time getting there.
Contact Mary Fortune at thirtytensomething.blogspot.com.