365

It’s been a year here in Western New York. That’s a benchmark that might have passed unnoticed had there not been a recent flurry of the kind of activity that one has to stand back from once it’s completed in order to assess the results. The activity included the Spring Benefit that I’ve been working on. The event was an enormous success, and it gives me deep and very personal pleasure to know that it was in service (and gratitude) to my brother and his wife and their vision. For a lapsed egotist like me, it was somewhat confounding to know both once and at the same time that it actually and genuinely was in service to them: all I kept thinking was that I wanted it to be as if I wasn’t there. In fact, the morning of the event I found myself wishing there was some way to turn the reins of the entire crazy thing over to someone's else. But I also knew that I was bringing to the table a sense of social life that took root in me a long, long time ago. It’s deeply part of me, and part of my identity as a member of my immediate family. Maybe it's even older than that, a sense of tribe around the campfire, of chant, and dance, and firelight under starlight. At times ours was the sort of household of which my friends later said, Can I come over to your house for Christmas? It wasn’t always thus; it didn’t easily remain thus, but my parents have always been social people. My brother and sister-in-law seldom have the chance to shine in that sort of setting, and really, when it comes right down to it, that’s what I wanted the evening to be: a chance for them and what they are, what they do, to shine. I wanted my role to be that of the arranger of the black velvet background. That my parents ended up RSVPing to the benefit invitation I sent them (somewhat as a lark) only added to the magic of the evening. They were a big hit, and their new grandson was a big hit to them, and they were a big hit to the kids. I was a little bereft when they left so quickly. Rarely have I enjoyed their company so much and in such depth. It seems a gift of age and time, one that took a long time to reveal itself, yet has done so with undeniable actuality.

Perhaps I naturally find myself wondering, Now what? There are valid reasons for me to remain here in Western New York, and certainly for the time being I have a lot I can keep doing. For one thing, I still want to help around the house, in the yard. I want to put the finishing touches (if you can call a railing a touch!) on the deck my brother and I started last year. I want to get the front door painted; want to fix up the breezeway. I want to see the idea of the production of Midsummer Night’s Dream become a reality. I want to be here when Ian starts talking, and walking. I want to finish the draft of my family memoir—it’s never gone so well, and I know that having been here, with family, living ordinarily and closely and messily despite all the (trivial, trivial) snags, has made the difference. But I’ve felt in recent days and weeks that what might come to be revealed has manifested itself somehow: that for all its depth and surface pleasure, pleasure of a very real kind that I have not really known before, Western New York may not be where I’m really supposed to be. It’s where I’ve been for twelve months now, and where I’ve flourished, but perhaps a healthy plant can take root anywhere, and maybe this may not be where I’ll land for myself. Much of what I’ve done in the last year has been for my brother and his family; it’s been, as I’ve said, a hugely satisfying experience. But now I am a little more than curious to know what my life will feel like once I’ve begun to channel more of those capabilities in the service of a life that will be and remain more entirely my own.