Good morning Sweetheart, wherever you are...

Twenty-one years ago today, your mama gave us you.

How I looked forward to waking up with you on this special day, to share the joy I know it brings you even as I sit here at the keyboard with you and Mississippi on my mind. You are the first and only thing to get my attention this morning—except for this cup of French Roast brewed for this reflection.

Twenty-one today. A new page. A new man. I think of your cheerful demeanor, your naturally exuberant personality, the smile that always left me breathless, and I wonder how all of that played out in the child that was you, years ago. I envy those who watched the entire transformation of you into the bright young man that you are today. It's hard to believe how recently you were still only a boy, not all that long before we met nearly three years ago.

Now you’re twenty-one. Innocence begins its reluctant submission to experience. The new-soul luster starts giving way to a savvy-soul patina. I don’t think anyone ever wanted to get there as much as you did. I know your mama's proud of you—and I know she’ll cry. In a way, her loss is like mine; we both knew we couldn’t keep you. Neither of us planned to.

Her joy is like mine too. As a mother, hers is infinitely deeper, of course, but we’re both proud of you and glad your life is moving on—and in ways good for you, we both hope.

In the song "The Way We Were" a line speaks to how we quickly forget any painful memories and remember only the good ones. I've known how that works since long before meeting you—an advantage of much experience—and it consoles me now.

Do you miss me? Will I cross your mind today? Do you really understand in what way I loved you?  I told you from the start, from the very first time you said the "L" word two years ago, that mine would be a limited love. I said we couldn't last, shouldn't last. Did you really understand? You never said your love was limited, but of course I always knew it was. It had to be, for one so new to manhood. For me there were no surprises.

...Unless you count my surprise at how small the disappointments were compared to the intensity of our joy. Or my surprise at how long we burned before reluctantly turning down the flame we knew could not be eternal. "Comfortable" is how I'll remember you. Comfortable, as in a passion and intensity that really worked for us. ...As in how we always clicked, awake or asleep—always turning together, never moving out of each other's arms—not even by dawn. Not even by summer's end. Comfortable, as in never imagining a better fit—but for this age thing.

We almost reached this special day together. But not quite, and it hurts more than I imagined it would, and more than I want to admit. Intellectually I knew the ending in advance—the why, the how, the when. I had the schedule down! But my plan to ignore the pain fell flat.

Such pain is but a pittance paid for joy. It is a price embraced. For a moment I choose to look it in the face, to feel it, to admit to the empty place in me that you so richly graced. For a moment I allow the full attention of my heart to focus on a gentle lad a thousand miles away, one among millions, a heart now beating in another world, another time and space—his breath-taking smile now turned in other directions.

I thank my lucky stars that our worlds crossed. We came together—glowed together—for a few moments. Now, like clockwork, and as surely as the glow of a passing comet fades, we zoom on within our separate orbits, having hardly paused, space accumulating between us. It is life. The glorious stuff of life.

Published in the 1996 Journal of the National Association of Black & White Men Together;

and in the Kinship Connection, March, 1996.  Copyright © 1996 by Larry Hallock

Bittersweet tribute