My Time Is Water Down A Drain

The room is long and narrow. Along one wall, there is a row of chairs. Cheap, conference-room style; wooden frames, thin cushions, fabric fraying at the edges. Which seems appropriate enough. There is a small table, covered with magazines. Half children's magazines - puzzles and word games, mazes and brief pictorial articles on animals and faraway lands - and half women's magazines. Checkout aisle fodder. Fashion. Diets. Lifestyle. There is a tragic lack of gossip. Other hands, at other times of the week, must take those into their own and carry them out of here, down the stairs, out to their cars and away.

I try not to be bitter.

There is, oddly, no clock on the wall. Which leaves us there, sitting in our uncomfortable conference room chairs, compulsively checking our watches at irregular intervals, an involuntary behavioral tic that in no way, shape or form reflects our anxiety and impatience at finding ourselves, sitting, sometimes quietly and sometimes not, in this room, passing this slow hour. Waiting for the world to change.

We are not alone. There are, invariably, other children in the room. Siblings. Brought along for the ride, or because there is no other place for them to be, or because logistics are complicated and sometimes we find ourselves in buildings we had never thought to enter, had never hoped to see with our own eyes. They know this is a place where we are supposed to be quiet, and they do their best to accommodate. It is not always easy for girls of four or boys of eight. But they do their best to distract themselves, or to allow themselves to be distracted. Gameboys. Coloring books. Tiny princess toys.

I am, almost invariably, the only man here. Swirling around me, weaving in and out on the staggered tangents of their own unique hours, is a stream of mothers and mothers' helpers. More of the latter than you might expect, really. I do not think too deeply on it, or pass judgment, as these hours coincide with working hours - it is a working hour for us, and our own, as well - and there are accommodations we all must make. My schedule offers some flex, and so we take advantage, and I am glad to be here.

Well. No. Not entirely true. Rephrase: I am glad that I can integrate this into our lives with relatively minimal disruption. I understand how important it is, or may be. I'm aware of how much more so many others can and do sacrifice, each and every day, in attempts to reach similar ends. I do not think too deeply on that, either. Those aches, those sympathies, run deep and dark and quick.

And so I sit patiently. I wait, I wait, I wait, I wait. I stare at the walls and do not think of the purposed and subtle strategies being executed on the other side, where simple games and role playing and turn taking and the work of play mask intricate therapies. The rules of context and give and take. The fundamentals of social language, and socialization.

Such fine tools, being placed in such nervous but willing hands. At times, I can hear my son's laughter through the drywall. The sounds is muffled but familiar: a frequency I am trained to recognize, a sound that primes me for response. A cue. I hear his laughter, and I look up. Searching for eyes that will meet mine.