Ghost in the House
My son’s ghost is haunting my house and it’s bringing me down.
After Sam goes home, his room generally stays exactly how it was when he left. So for the past two weeks, this enormous green tyrannosaurus model he build has stood silently staring at the wall. I walk by it every morning on my way to read the Internets and down some coffee. His Legos are like little fossils, reminders of his visit and the brightness and energy he brought into the house. His bed sits there in the same unmade state it was when I drove him home almost a month ago. Usually I get over this in a week or so, but not this time. Sam’s not coming back for a long visit until December, and every day I walk past his room, the silence reminds me of his absence and makes me sad.
But I can’t close the door, because what good will that do? Better to look at it, feel the pain, and maybe sooner or later I’ll be desensitized to it.
I suppose I’m not handling this very well, but it’s hard to be satisfied when you’re limited to (quite literally) an hour or two in August, slightly more in September, and 2.5 days in October. And on the two former dates, I’m driving 16 hours round trip to see him, all at my expense.
It’s also problematic when it spills into the rest of my life. As most of you know, I’m a writer: I think for a living. Right now, I have a huge grant on my desk that needs editing, and my mind just isn’t firing on all 8 cylinders. It just keeps drifting back to the darkened room, the messy bed, and the lonely dinosaur staring at the wall. I don’t think I’ve even turned off the Christmas lights since he left, the ones that decorate the walls around the windows.
There’s a ghost in the house, and I really want it to stop haunting me.
