A brief glimpse into an afternoon mothering a 13 year old boy

On a recent sweltering August afternoon in Austin I pile my son George and his friend Tommy in our Honda to go to Barton Springs.

“You’re not wearing shoes?”, I ask Tommy as I eye his large, bare feet, picturing shards of glass and lit cigarette butts impaled in the soles of his feet.

“Nah, we’re just going to Barton Springs.”, he says, viewing me skeptically like I have a huge  booger hanging out of my nose.

“Okay.’  I realize that someday I’m going to have to shuck this thing that I pretend I have.

It’s called Control.  As we pull into the parking lot the tires kick up hot yellow dust everywhere.  George rolls up his window and inquires nervously,

“Mom, you’re not going to sit anywhere near us are you?”

“No, Honey, I’ll relax under the tree with the big roots where I always am.  You guys go wherever you want.”

The exhalations of relief are audible.

After about an hour and a half I spy the two figures loping up the hill toward me.  One is stocky, muscular and hairy.  He looks like an actual man, Fred Flintstone, in fact.  The other is tall and lithe, with broad, angular shoulders and bushy eyebrows resembling Leonid Breshnev’s.  I temporarily flash back to an afternoon nine years ago when I took these same two guys to the same park, except that at that time they were small, precious, and affectionate – eager to hold my hand as we crossed the parking lot.  They were wearing matching bright yellow T shirts with a train design on the front. That day we rode the park train, the Zilker Zephyr, and the boys covered their ears and eyes when we rode through the dark tunnel. They looked up at me for reassurance, wide eyed and thrilled.

Today as they approach me they seem to be intentionally averting their eyes, as if I’m invisible or sunbathing topless.

“We’re hungry!”, they grunt.

“You just like me for my money.”, I say teasingly.

“You got that right!”, my son guffaws.

I hand them a twenty and they amble toward the the concession stand. Some time later they’re sitting by the edge of the pool, their hairy legs dangling in the frigid water.  I walk down by them and they leap in and swim away, like frogs I’ve startled.  I sigh and go flop down on my towel.  Just as I’m drifting off to sleep I hear my son’s newly, deep croaky voice,

“Here Mom.”

He gingerly places a small object on the edge of my towel.  I squint at the corner of blue terry cloth.  There lies a tiny rock, smaller than a dime, perfectly shaped like a heart.  I watch their backs as they head over to their own spot under the tree.