Morning Time

Last week

my childhood best friend

texted a frayed thread of childhood best friends

that his mom had died.

The message before that said his mother was drifting

and that she loved us. 

As his mom drifted, I drifted too.

Back to the cabinets

in that enormous house on Amory Street

full of Sunkist, Coke, Sprite,

Gushers, Fruit by the Foot, Fruit Roll-Ups,

Dunkaroos, Shark Bites, Soft Batch cookies, Hydrox,

every cereal box worth its weight in sugar,

and whole cans of black olives

bought especially for me,

pitted,

like everything else,

against my appetite

and losing.

Oh,

not to mention cable, video games, early internet,

basketball hoop in the driveway, tv in the basement, tv in the kitchen,

ping pong table, miscellaneous toys, multiple bathrooms,

and room to roam.

This was my second home.

An alternate domestic universe

where restriction was replaced

by just having the things that were restricted.

How odd to be able to access all the desires at once.

The distinction here being less about class

than about permission.

Permissiveness felt like freedom.

And everything felt like cavities.

My friend's mom sometimes called me her fourth child

as she squeezed me,

smoke on her breath,

and sent me on my way to my first home

with my sweaty dad and his bicycle.

Of all my friends' parents,

Marty was the one who knew me best.

Who was the most approachable.

Who took genuine interest.

Who championed me.

What a special feeling

—to be championed.

And what a strange verb.

We were morning people,

Marty and I,

who found each other awake

amidst the endless sleepers.

Anywhere else I was condemned

to pass silent hours in friends’ bedrooms

waiting for them to wake up.

But if I was at my second home

I could wander down

or wander up from the basement

and find Marty in the kitchen

watching the news in her robe,

or reading the newspaper,

happy to see me,

happy to feed me,

happy to talk.

It was rare

to be engaged so openly

and to have time with a friend’s parent

without the friend.

When her son and I began to untangle in high school,

Marty and I got fewer and fewer mornings.

Yet we arranged to have one

five years ago

at her son’s wedding in Dallas,

in the lobby of the hotel,

as the others slept.

We had coffee

and let a decade pass between us.

It was our last one. 

When I texted my mom

that Marty had died

and that I missed her,

my mom texted back—

       She adored you. You also brought her a lot a lot of pleasure.

       I love you, sweetheart.

Ignoring what I thought was a typo, and not emphasis, I wrote back—

       Thanks mom. 

       And thanks for letting me spend all of 5th grade at their house.

My mom added a thumbs up on top of my message.

We left it at that. 

I think it's hard

to show gratitude

to the people who raise you.

And I remember as a kid

I had trouble understanding

that pitted meant the pit

is already gone.