My son’s room is like a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Toppled block buildings and crayon-wrapper debris lay atop overturned die-cast cars and plastic little-people corpses. Blankets have tumbled to the floor like a California mud-slide. I don’t want to think about the refugees hastily rushed under the bed.
I’ve seen this before, in my own room, years ago. I can still hear my mom hollering at me to clean up my act. I can remember those times when she would look at me, exasperated, and say: “Someday, you’ll be grown up. You’re going to have a kid, and you’ll understand.”
Mom didn’t live long enough to see my kids, or to hear me apologize to her for all the grief I put her through. But she was right. I’m all grown up, and I’m beginning to understand.
