Monday morning. My 64th birthday. I woke up in the dorm after 7 a.m., and Harrison was still asleep. I got up and made coffee. I was anxious about his oversleeping. I knew it probably would result in a meltdown. So would waking him up. I put a cup of coffee by his bedside.
He sat up and immediately opened his laptop. He drank his coffee in silence, with piano music playing from his computer. Suddenly, he realized what time it was and erupted into a tantrum. “I’m late for breakfast!” He threw his clothes and himself around the room and pounded on the beds. I reassured him that he was not really late, that he had plenty of time for breakfast before welding class. It would not register. This went on and on for what seemed like an hour, but was probably only a few minutes.
Finally, he insisted that I go with him to breakfast. It was the last thing I wanted to do — I rarely ate breakfast in the cafeteria. He insisted. Realizing I was in a no-win situation, I told him I’d go if he agreed to quiet down. I got dressed and met him outside. He started up the noise again, and I told him that I would not go into the cafeteria if he continued. He grabbed me by the arm and started dragging me over the icy pavement.
In this way, we slowly reached the doors of the cafeteria. He went inside and then ran to the conference room to hide. Fortunately, the only other person in there was Debbie Garcia, the cafeteria manager. I told her what was happening. She went to the conference room to talk to him. Over the past two years, Debbie had defused countless situations like this in the cafeteria. She had always gone out of her way to make Harrison feel included and to comfort him when he was having problems. She had often gone out of her way to make him feel seen and welcome. In times I had chosen to eat meals in the cafeteria, she also went out of her way to tell me that Harrison was special to her, and always made me feel welcome and at home as a parent eating there.
I got some eggs and fruit, and Harrison returned and poured a bowl of cereal. He ate loudly. I talked with Debbie. She was as calming to me as she was to him. Then it was time to go. We now had just a few minutes to get to welding class. Harrison freaked out again, yelling, “It’s too late!” I told him he was not too late, and even if he was, Charlie would not care if he were a couple of minutes behind. We went back to his room, and he got dressed for welding. Then the two of us trudged up to the welding shop with him carrying his bag of gear and me his plastic bucket full of metal coupons.
Once there, the spell was broken, and he went right to work. I went back to the room and straightened up, unpacked some of Harrison’s clothes. Got a shower. I drove off-campus to see if the Mineral Belt had been groomed, and found it covered in fresh snow. Instead of skiing, I drove into Leadville to get a coffee but found the small shop I wanted to visit closed. I stopped in to talk to Smokey at Community Threads. Darren called to discuss travel plans for Harrison to the upcoming CU meet in Boulder. Soon, my free time was up, and I drove back to the welding shop, arriving at the end of the class. Harrison was smoothing out his work at the grinding wheel, staring intently at a weld through his safety glasses, his hair pulled back by his cloth welding hat. He was smiling.
After lunch and another coffee, I walked with Harrison to the library for tutoring with Christie. We went over the assignments he needed to complete in the final weeks. Then I left them to work and headed out to ski on the CMC trails, which had actually been freshly groomed.
Out among the trees, the fresh snow dampened human noise. The deep cold of winter was gone, but it was not warm at this altitude, and a breeze whispered through the pines. Lodgepole trunks were dark with white highlights, and gusts knocked small avalanches from branches. I skied the classic tracks, but in stretches of trail where the tracks were missing, or on downhills where the double tracks were very tight through the curves, I jumped out of the grooves and skated. The college trails are hilly, and I skied uphill for a mile, crossed the Mineral Belt, onto a short loop, then descended back onto the college trails. Tracks indicated one other skier and a couple of snowshoers were the only others out. The snow seemed soft in contrast to the figurative rock cliff I was up against with Harrison. I was dangerously close to the point of surrender, and maybe letting go was the greatest lesson in all of this. Regardless, in this hour, I found refuge and solace in the snowy forest.
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Boy, Hal !!
Just wondering if Harrison knows what a Super Hero he has for his dad?