EPISODE 1 EPISODE 1About an hour into the trip, I blew a royal gasket.
“If you think for one cotton-picking minute that I’m just here to play chauffeur while you visit these colleges, you’d better think again!” I blared at Hayden from the driver’s seat as our car chugged down the Massachusetts Turnpike.
I knew our weekend trip to visit two colleges in Upstate New York was one of those ephemeral opportunities for me to bond with Hayden, and I had planned to make the best of it.
Ever well intentioned, I peppered Hayden with friendly questions about his interests, friends, and school, in hopes that one of my probes would ignite an in-depth mother-son conversation to pass the time. However, my inquiries were met with typical resistance, eliciting only grunts, one-word answers, and the dreaded eye roll.
I just couldn’t take it anymore, and I snapped.
During my cathartic rant, I explained to Hayden that the college trip was an important step in his becoming an independent person, a responsible adult, a man. I told him refusing to converse with his mother who was facilitating and financing the trip was not only rude, it was immature.
He hated that word, so I strategically ended with it, and then fell silent.
A few miles later, Hayden asked me a question. Not “Are we there yet?” or “When are you going to buy me dinner?” but a well-planned dialogue starter. We conversed for a few fleeting minutes before he fell sound asleep.
Three hours later, he awoke to our GPS announcing, “You have arrived at your destination.”
I quelled the awkwardness of sharing a hotel room with then eighteen-year-old Hayden by ordering pizza and resisting the urge to remind him to brush his teeth. Soon after his three-hour car nap, he sprawled on his bed in sweatpants and headphones and dropped off to sleep for the night.
Knowing the days of seeing my children sleep would soon be over, I lingered a minute or two before turning out the light, watching his chest heave and his eyelids twitch.
In the morning, we found ourselves following a bubbly backward-walking female tour guide along angled walkways, between ivy-covered academic buildings and through student unions. The campus looked beautiful in the autumnal morning light, but I was watching Hayden for hints of reaction. I knew if I asked him what he thought of the school, he’d give me the same half-grunted response every time: “M’good.”
Despite my warning, Hayden wolfed down a meatball sub for lunch in the car on our way to the next college. Once in the lobby of the admissions building, without saying, “I told you so,” I showed him to the restroom where he could blot the red sauce stains off his tie.
After the tour, we had a scheduled meeting with a professor, to discuss the requirements of the computer science degree. The professor’s bio indicated that he had done cutting-edge research on the science behind modern social media networks, so we were surprised to be met by a sweet old gentleman with a Russian accent, white hair, and a mild palsy in his left hand.
The professor spoke softly across his cluttered desk, whispering sage advice to Hayden about his college years.
“You must use this time in your life,” he paused to emit an almost imperceptible gasp, before continuing, “… to become a man.”
Still splotched with signs of lunch, Hayden listened intently, unable to hide his utter admiration for this master of computer science. With eager eyes, he asked questions about programming languages, algorithms, and data structures. I sat, dumbfounded, while the old professor and my son built a delightful rapport. Forty-five minutes later, they exchanged wide grins and sincere handshakes, promising to keep in touch.
On the ride home, while Hayden slept soundly in the seat beside me, I thought about the old professor’s “you’re a man now” advice. Francis and I had told him the same thing so many times. Why doesn’t he listen to us?
An exit or two later, I recollected that during the meeting with the old professor, I saw Hayden successfully communicate his intentions, ask mature questions, and show genuine respect like an intelligent adult.
I glanced over at my splotched, grunting, stubborn young man and realized he had been listening all along.