Friendship has always been a convenience for me, not a necessity. My son is teaching me differently. He seeks out companionship and works through misunderstandings to nurture relationships. When an argument ensues, he is the first to call, linger, and compromise. He is always the last to walk away. How did he learn these things when quick to anger is my natural inclination? My Sicilian blood runs hot and fast within me. Before any other lineage can have a say, I go to “you are dead to me.”  Experience has taught me that nothing gold can stay. Eventually, every promise needs contextualization, re-evaluation, and explanation to remove its initial obligation. Things change. People change. Move on.

But my son knows none of this, and when I complimented him for being a good friend by reaching out rather than just keeping the door open, he said, “Why can’t you do that?”

I wanted to pretend like either there was nothing to forgive–play the denial card. Then, I thought about saying forgiveness isn’t for everyone–like an ice cream flavor.  Another approach came to mind: appear like I didn’t know what he meant–the dumb and dumbfounded act. But I did know what he was talking about. I knew he knew I knew he knew.  He saw someone leave our house sad, and I couldn’t fix it with them. Scot knows that’s not like me to leave it be, and so I had to talk about it. How do you say to your child that sometimes there just isn’t a way to get there from here? I tried to explain something that is true to frame a motherly answer.

“Children are like playdough–flexible, malleable. You can shape and mold them. Adults are more like bricks. They are stuck. At one time, they were shaped, but now it is tough for them to move without breaking. Sometimes, what looks like a brick is just playdough left unattended for too long. But that is hard to know.”

He understood, but I admitted that both playdough and bricks stay in the same place unless an outside kindness is applied. In other words, no change happens without initiative.  If I want to improve the situation, all I need to do is take a lesson from my son: call, linger, compromise, and be the last to leave.