Little Squirrels Can Climb Tall Trees (18 page)

“No,” I corrected, “you are an
awesome
man.”

Kyle looked at his mother and said, “Okay. I have a question. Actually, I have a whole bunch of questions, but I’ll start with one. Who are you? I’ve never heard you say ‘damn’, and I’ve never heard you refer to others as ‘old crones’, and I’ve never even known that you knew about men cheating on their wives. So who are you?”

“I’m a crazy old mixed-up woman.”

Kyle was quiet for a moment, clearly trying to decide what question to ask next and how exactly to phrase it. “Why were you so strict with me when I was growing up? Why no fun? Why no movies? Why no airplanes?”

“Well, there were two things. One was your father is the cheapest SOB on the face of the planet. But mostly it was your grandmother.” She looked at me and explained, “Wicked old
witch
of a woman. She lived with us for years and nearly drove me insane. I hated her with a cold, hard passion.” Turning back to her son, she went on. “She always had this holier-than-thou attitude. It took me years to learn that that was all just an act. And I fell for it for too much of my life. The happiest day of my life was when we buried that old woman. I still go by her grave every once in a while just so I can spit on her. If there’s some dog around, I encourage them to go pee on her grave.”

Kyle’s eyes were as wide open as humanly possible. Clearly this was all new information for him. “But….”

“She made my life a living hell about so many things, including the way I raised you kids. And it worked so well. You’ve all moved away except your crazy sister Patti. I must have dropped her on her head at some point, but I just don’t remember it. She bought that whole act your grandmother was selling, and now she sits in her big house with her big husband and passes judgment on how the whole world isn’t as good as she is. And the truth is that her husband is now out banging some other man’s wife.

“And my good kids, like you, moved as far away as possible—and I know are never coming back—because they’re good kids who somehow got through those years and have been able to build good lives for themselves all by themselves. Like you’ve done, baby. And you belong here—anywhere but back there. I miss you every day. That place is where I was born and grew up, but it is a place full of two-faced lying scum.”

“Unfortunately, those people are just about everywhere.”

“But back there no one will ever talk about anything real. They will never confront issues. Never admit to doing wrong. Will always be quick to condemn but just as quick to sweep some personal wrongdoing under the carpet. They paint everything with pretty makeup, but it’s still the same pig underneath.

“Last night when you stood up before all those people and took on that man, I was so proud. And the way you and that woman drove that man off the stage,” she chuckled. “Made an old woman proud that my son could do that with his words, with his brains. I love you, son. Whatever anyone does or says, I will always love you. You’re my son. I’ve got a lot of learning to do, and a lot of unlearning to do. And I’ll be honest with you—I don’t know if I can do it. Will you help me?”

“Absolutely!” he said as he stood and grabbed his mother in a hug. “Love you too, Mama! I never thought we’d ever be able to have a conversation like this. Makes me proud to be your son.”

“Okay, okay,” I added, “now you’re gonna make me cry if you don’t stop soon.”

Kyle opened up his arms and drew me into a three-way hug with his mother.

When everyone had recollected their emotions and felt presentable once again, Kyle’s mother asked a surprising question. “So, are you two married yet?”

There was no way on the face of the earth that I was touching that question, so I simply looked at Kyle and passed the question to him. “No,” he answered.

“Why not? I understand it’s legal in New York State now.”

“We hadn’t thought about it.”

“Well, think about it. If you love him, marry him. Simple as that.”

Kyle considered her words for a moment, still looking stunned that we were having this conversation. “I do love him, Mama.”

“Good. Make me one promise.”

“Of course. What?”

“Send me an invitation. I want to be there. And even though it’ll just frost your father’s Wheaties, I’ll fly back here. I want to be here.”

Kyle explained, “Remember, my dad is frugal.”

“Frugal! Hell, he’s so damned cheap it’s embarrassing most of the time.”

“So how’d you talk him into spending the money for this trip?”

“I didn’t. I wouldn’t even bother. I sold some of my quilts and earned the money myself. Quilts have become real hot lately, and at the county fair, we get a lot of city folks who want homemade, handmade things. A bunch of us are only too happy to help them out and take their money in the process. Earned it all myself.”

Kyle laughed with his mother.

While Kyle and his mother talked some more, I cooked breakfast for the three of us. We ended up spending the day together, having a wonderful time. Since it was a beautiful afternoon we shared a walk in the park. At one point we sat and watched the squirrels all running around, finding nuts and frantically digging holes to bury them in for winter.

“They sure are high-energy little creatures with those nuts, aren’t they?” she asked.

Kyle and I both worked really, really hard to suppress a laugh but readily agreed.

When we parted company the next day, it was on terms that none of us had ever anticipated but all were so grateful we had achieved.

A
FEW
weeks later, we loaded a few things into the car and, one Saturday morning, drove north to see my family in Vermont. The drive was gorgeous, with some trees still loaded with multicolored leaves. It looked as if someone had taken a palate of colors and just painted the countryside. It was so beautiful. New England in fall was an experience that couldn’t be described adequately. Everything was preparing for a long nap through the winter. The trees shed their leaves. The flowers and bushes all stopped blooming and growing and went to sleep. Mother Nature was tucking everything in to keep it safe through the dark days ahead.

The closer we got, the more nervous Kyle appeared to become. He was fidgeting constantly and just exuded nervousness. I was getting quite concerned, but in the final hour of the drive he seemed to calm down tremendously, and by the time we got there, you would never have known that he had been nervous.

As I knew they would, my family absolutely adored Kyle and showered him with welcome. True to his promise, my father gave Kyle a personal guided tour of the maple syrup production facility. Maybe calling it a “facility” was too much since it was all manual—no mechanization whatsoever was involved in the process, right down to the fact that they used wood to heat the pan that cooked the sap into syrup. The giant wooden paddles they used to keep the cooking sap moving so it didn’t burn were true antiques. My father proudly explained to Kyle, “My father used these here to do the same work. And his father before him as well.”

Later Kyle told me that he loved the tour, felt very comfortable with my family, was absolutely fascinated by the production process, and relished the opportunity to taste the homemade syrup on a hearty batch of my mother’s pancakes. The ingredients were so simple, but the meal made for one of the most satisfying he’d ever eaten. And no one left the table hungry.

The entire weekend was a wonderful experience. Kyle was absolutely blown away by the openness and honesty of the family. There were no secrets. There were no lies. We just lived our lives in front of one another. It was all so radically different than the world he had known when growing up. We held nothing back, even if it involved yelling.

I found out that when Kyle first heard yelling at the dinner table, he was convinced that Armageddon had arrived and the perfect family was self-destructing in front of him. He told me later that he was greatly relieved when he noticed that while we were all animated, no one seemed mad at one another, and that he eventually figured out that regardless of the emotion, positive or negative, we just lived it all in front of one another, openly and honestly. I think he began to see that there was just no way one could be closeted in this family.

One visit and Kyle was in love with my family. Which led him to do something that he had not planned on doing (or so he told me later, and I believe him). He hadn’t thought much about the subject and certainly hadn’t planned to bring it up during a family dinner. But during our final dinner together, it just hit him like a ton of bricks falling on him that this was the right thing to do. No, this was the
only
thing to do. He hadn’t rehearsed any words of wisdom. He just opened his mouth and let the moment guide him to do the right thing.

“Excuse me,” he politely said to get the floor. Everyone stopped talking and paid attention to Kyle. “I have a question for Joseph.” They were all quite surprised when Kyle got up out of his chair, knelt on one knee on the floor, and said, “Jo-Jo, my little squirrel, will you marry me?”

Lots of applause rose around the table, along with cheers and even a couple of squeals of delight. Kyle would normally have been terrified to ask such a personal question, not to mention asking it in front of others like this.

I was stunned. There is just no other way to describe how I felt. Stunned. We hadn’t talked about the idea at all even though his mother had brought the subject up during her visit to New York. I simply looked at Kyle for a moment in disbelief and then nodded. “Yes.” I didn’t need lots of time to consider my answer. There was only one answer, an emphatic yes!

Applause turned into cheers. We sort of threw ourselves at each other, hugged, and whispered, “I love you.”

When I had recovered my wits enough, I whispered in Kyle’s ear a question of my own. “So, was it worth all the trouble I put you through in the beginning?”

“I just asked you to marry me, didn’t I?”

“True. So is that a ‘yes’?”

“Yes! Yes! Yes! Do you think I ask all the guys I date to marry me?” Kyle joked.

“Well, you said you hadn’t done much dating….”

“You’re my first proposal. And my last, since I’m in this for the long haul.”

“Love ya, babe!”

The
next morning we drove back to New York City, where we spent one night at home before taking the subway to Newark Airport just across the river the following day. Thinking that flying first thing in the morning or last thing at night were probably not good things, I had booked us on a late-morning flight. It was midweek, which I also thought was probably better than trying to fly anywhere on a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. I wanted Kyle’s first flight to be a good experience.

The entire airport experience was brand new for Kyle. It was still astonishing to me that my partner had never been in an airport or on an airplane. We both had packed light, so we only had carry-on baggage. Still, getting through security was the usual slow process. As we waited, I again wondered why people didn’t simply admit that profiling was a fact of life and that some people should have more screening than others and that many, many travelers were frequent flyers who were well-known to the airlines. But alas, the airlines only wanted to take my money and didn’t really care about my opinions.

Once we made it through security and had re-dressed, I led Kyle to our gate. Our timing was good, which gave us only about twenty minutes to wait before our flight was due to start boarding. Kyle was absolutely captivated by the entire experience. He never stopped studying the crowds.

When the flight was called, I led Kyle immediately to the gate since I had bought and paid for two first-class tickets and first class got to board first—or last, whatever we wanted. The main reason to board first was to find a place to store your suitcase, but in first class that was less of an issue since there were fewer people and more overhead storage compartments. Still, I wanted to get Kyle on the plane so he could look around, check everything out, and see what it all looked like.

With our bags stashed away and the overhead compartment closed, I put Kyle in the window seat so he could watch out the window during the flight. Even though I had warned Kyle that flights were frequently delayed by any number of factors, including weather, delayed incoming flights, delayed flight crews, ramp slowdowns, you name it, none of those factors appeared to be issues that day.