Posts from — March 2010

We are in a jeep, driving across the Serengeti with our assigned safari partners, the Gurtz family.  Not only do they have an alluring and scantily clad 15 year old daughter (a fact not lost on my son) but also an energetic ten year old boy who’s new hobby is shaking up cans of Coke and spraying them all over the inside of the vehicle.

Outside there is an ostrich mommy communing with her chicks, and I’d like to be taking her picture but at this point it seems far more prudent to cram my camera up under my shirt ’til the kid runs out of soda.   I shoot a savage look at his mother.  When she looks back, I chuckle and shake my head in that way (we moms) always use to say “Gosh, he’s just adorable.

Right behind her is my son who, sitting next to the perpetually bouncing babe seems to be happy for the first time in ohhh, about seventy five weeks.  My heart begins to lift.  Maybe he’s only happy because he’s sitting next to a sexy bra-less 15 year old, but I don’t care.  He is happy IN AFRICA. Maybe the vixen has slipped him some kind of mind altering drug.  I don’t care.  He is happy IN AFRICA and so he is enjoying the trip and it was my idea and I am right and that is all that matters.   I begin to speak to Mrs. Gurtz who turns out to be fun and honestly self-deprecating.  Of her own accord, she gives me permission to physically abuse her son if I think he needs it.  I laugh but she says she’s serious. She must know what she’s doing.  She’s a psychologist.

I pull my camera out from my now dry and sugar encrusted t-shirt and begin to take pictures of grazing zebras framed by thousands of flamingos.  It is a stunning sight.  I look over and risk smiling at Danny, but when he catches my eye, an odd thing happens. His face turns from pleased to annoyed.  ”No,” I think, “this must be my imagination.  We’ve already established, he’s really happy IN AFRICA.”  I shake it off and smack the Gurtz kid on the side of his head .  Life is good.

That night, all the kids in our group migrate to a table of their own.   As I pretend to eat some kind of thick greenish-black stew, I glance over at Danny.  He doesn’t see me.  He is laughing.  He is engaged and smiling.   It’s been eight, maybe eight and a half hours since he’s groaned or whined or stared at me with sheer loathing.

After dinner, (since there’s not much to do besides wander around and become prey to some ravenous animal,)  we find our (yes, armed) chaperone and walk to the room.  I know I should just shut up. I am aware that if I push my son and ask if he’s having fun it could easily ruin what seems to have been a pleasant day … and yet…

I can’t help it.  I NEED this.  I NEED him to tell me that the two thousand hours of work I’ve done to get us here has been worth it.  That he’s finding new friends,  seeing awe inspiring sights, opening his mind to other cultures and customs.  I open my stupid mouth…

“So, it seems like you had a good day.”

Long pause.

“What?”

“I mean, you looked like you were having fun.”

His eyes become slits.  ”When?”

“Uh, today.  On the safari… (then, weakly) and, you know, at — dinner?”

“Huh.”  And he turns away.

I don’t ask again.  It’s too painful.   Day after day for two weeks I watch him dance with Masaii Warriors, flirt with girls, swim in pools surrounded by warthogs and sail in hot air balloons over charging rhinos, only to return to camp every night, stricken and giving me the silent treatment.  I have robbed him of his Christmas vacation.  Every night he becomes more defeated, crying out,  ”How many more days do we have to beeee heeere?”   Every morning he pulls himself exhausted from his bed of anguish.  Out on safari he puts on a good show, but clearly, he’s miserable.  I resign myself to believing that someday he’ll look back on this trip and maybe appreciate the effort.

Months later I’m sitting in my office writing this, and he comes up behind me and starts reading over my shoulder.

“I need an ending,” I tell him.

“I think the ending is good,” he says.

“What ending?”

“Where I refuse to let you think that I’m having a good time.”

He turns and walks out.

“Wait,” I yell,  ”Where you…What?  You refuse to…. That was on PURPOSE?”

From the hallway: “Ya, duh.”

Kill me,

Rae.